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A DISCOURSE 



PRONOUNCED AT 



THE CAPITOL OF THE UNITED STATES, 



HALL OF REPRESENTATIVES, 



BEFORE THE 



AMERICAN HISTORICAL SOCIETY 



SECOND ANNUAL MEETING, 



JANUARY 20, 1837, 

y 

BY THE HON. LEVF WOODBURY 

H 
A MEMBER OF THE SOCIETY, 



J- WASHINGTON: 

PRINTED BY QaLEO S SEATON. 

1837. 



//' 



Sir : Washington, January 21, 1837. 

I am charged by the American Historical Society with ttie agreeable duty 
of presenting their Vote of Thanks, herewith enclosed, for the eloquent, interesting, 
and truly American Discourse delivered before them by you last evening, and to 
request the favor of a copy for publication. 

I am, with great respect, 

Your most obedient servant, 

V. MAXCY. 
To the Hon. Levi Woodbury, 

Washington. 



American Historical Society^ 

January 20, 1837. 

Resolved, That the Thank.s of the Society be presented to the Hon. Levi Wood- 
bury for the eloquent, interesting, and truly American Discourse delivered before 
the Society in the Hall of the House of Representatives this evening. 

Resolved, That Virgil Maxcy, Esq., present to the Hon. Levi Woodbury the 
Vote of Thanks of the Society, and ask of him a copy of his Discourse for 
publication. 

Extract from the minutes : 

H. M. MORFIT, Rec. Secretary. 



Sir : Washington, January 33, 1837. 

In reply to the request of the American Historical Society for a copy of 
my recent Discourse before them, communicated by you in so flattering a manner, 
I place it at your disposal ; with much regret, however, that leisure has not been 
enjoyed to make it more worthy the kindness evinced by the Society. 
I am, sir, very respectfully, 

Your obedient servant, 

LEVI WOODBURY. 
ViRGli. Maxcv^, Esq., Washington. 



DISCOURSE. 

My remarks this evening will be more particularly ad- 
dressed to the members of the " American Historical So- 
ciety," who compose a part of this respectable audience. 

The objects of that society, as announced in its consti- 
tution, are, " to discover, procure, and preserve whatever 
may relate to the natural, civil, literary, and ecclesiastical 
history of America in general, and of the United States in 
particular." 

It is worthy of notice that these objects, so very impor- 
tant and interesting, are wisely made to embrace a range 
much wider than the usual topics of history. 

The record merely of battles and changes in dynasties, 
or a series of chronological tables of all remarkable events, 
and which constitute the most general idea of the design 
of history, would, in the brief as well as republican career 
of the United States, be literally the " short and simple 
annals of the poor." Not much would be gained by adding 
to those the pittance, which in these respects is known of 
the rest of America^ a continent discovered but little more 
than three out of nearly the sixty centuries which have 
elapsed since the creation of mankind, and whose popula- 
tion, when not barbarous, has been much dispersed, com- 
paratively few in numbers, and seldom devoted to under- 
takings of great novelty or splendor. But, if wc enlarge 
our views, as becomes the elevated position of our society, 
raising and extending researches from records of important 
occurrences to the true use or dignity of history, the 
causes and consequences of those occurrences, and to every 



thing having a material bearing on man here in his social 
relations, whether natural, civil, religious, or literary, in 
their broadest senses, and we have before us inquiries of 
a noble and most attractive character, — sufficient also in 
number to engross the leisure which any or all of us are 
able to spare from the occupations of busy life, and ample 
enough in their scope to employ the severest industry, or 
tax the loftiest powers of analysis and judgment. It might 
be granted that naked historical facts may alone form one 
valuable branch of attention, and that the mere "honest 
chronicler" can be useful in his sphere. Yet, unlike the 
ballad-singer and the bard who precede him in the early 
stages of society, to gratify the natural love of mankind for 
a knowledge of the past, he must, if discarding all that is 
fable, or embellishment, become very sterile, unpeople 
much of the poetic and legendary lore of his predecessors, 
reduce many marvellous events to " a plain, unvarnished 
tale," and, like an honest geographer as to the interior of 
Africa or New Holland, leave large, frequent, and provo- 
king blanks. The only method of properly filling up such 
wastes in the history of a people recent in their origin, 
and absorbed chiefly in the arts and pursuits of peace, is 
that proposed in the constitution of our society. 

Without dwelling on the minutiae of the various inqui- 
ries thus contemplated, it certainly will be admitted to 
promise most usefulness, if we devote the chief attention 
of our association to those topics which, in its peculiar po- 
sition, are most accessible and most appropriate. But, 
while our labors are principally dedicated in this manner, 
nothing of an historical character on American affairs 
which can be procured with ease, need be entirely neglected, 
however humble the document or remote and apparently 
trivial its bearing. 

If its contents throw new light on the progress, pow- 
ers, or resources of any State, it is immaterial, whether it 



be only a newspaper or manuscript, or relate only to the 
voyage of some hardy fisherman to throw the hook or 
harpoon in unexplored seas, or to the description of even 
the smallest insect which glitters in the sunbeam ; the 
shell, whose couch is the " blue and boundless sea ;" the 
ore, that sleeps beneath the mountain's side; or the plant, 
whose leaf is sometimes the shroud as well as food for 
both man and the worm. Strange as it may seem to some, 
without due reflection, if, singling out our first illustration, 
they might find that a thorough knowledge of the most 
diminutive of the animal creation, its habits and history, 
may illustrate some of the most striking changes in the in- 
dustry and comforts of a numerous population. Like that 
of the Hessian fly, for instance, it might enable large sec- 
tions of our country to avert its ravages on the great staff 
of life, and yearly save millions of property from ruin ; 
or, like that of the ship-worm, may assist us to protect 
valuable portions of our navigation from premature decay ; 
or, like the cochineal and silk-worm, originate new articles 
of aid in manufactures or of lucrative commerce. 

A more accurate acquaintance with the signs of valuable 
minerals may also change the prosperity of whole States, by 
leading to the discoveries of lead, coal, iron, and salt, or more 
attractive but less useful gold. This has been evinced in 
our own day, within our own boundaries ; and the qualities 
of a new vegetable, better ascertained or more fully em- 
ployed, like those of tea or coff'ee, the cane, the hop, or 
cotton, may revolutionize the pursuits of a large territory, 
and carry wealth and refinement as well as comfort into the 
former abodes of poverty and wretchedness. (Note A.) 

But, at this time, passing by the further particulars of in- 
quiries like these, though your researches as an historical 
society ought not entirely to overlook any of the various 
tenants and products as well as qualities and peculiarities 
of our earth, sea, and air, encouraging the fstudv of nature, 



8 



.tonhaughs, to -P'^^/^^ JJ^^ ,he history of all the 
wildest refeats ; and P^ "= J .^j^„,, ^uhin the lim.ts 
neighboring natrons, colon es, and ^^^^ ^^^,„j 

„,■ the western . '-""'PJ-^^ ;J ^/i^itation, it seems more 
matter for warn.ng, and some io, ^,^^^^.^^^ ^^_ 

suitable for us to g.ve F«^*;"" ,„„„ected with the 
,,„ehes which are more -»^^ ' «'/ ,,^, „f these still 
peculiar position of our -^ J,^ ^f I, ,,e established 
Lppy and united ^7; J^ten:^' Oovernment, but no, 

not only at the seat of th ^_^^^^^ . .^rounded, a. 

remote from the great "arts i^e libraries an< 

„„ incorwenient ^-^.^^^^'t^ the centre between th. 
flourishing literary rnstau. on , ^^^^^^^^ ^ 

northern and southern f out." „,„„„i,„ion for fo. 

.veil as at the real centre o nter ^^^^^ ^^^.^,^^^^ 

eigners of distinctron, and for jh J ^^^ ^^^^^^^^^ 

judiciary, and ^'"'^'''''"^'ZJhe.e which is greate, 

Hence, the opportumty yfj^,,,,,,,y improved, 

and which should "e «-'"<' ™°='„„^ „„„ Government, 

to render complete the h.sto.y o ^^^^^.^„,„ 

,U Us general operations un^^ » P ^^^^^^ ^^ ^^^ 

Here are the records, »^ *^^ f/^ainal an object. M, 

spondence, in »"";^';".;;^,,,i publications in this cit, 

has been already done in eve P ^^_^^^^ ^, , 

throw light on the f<>™^''"s under the old confederal 
as on the officinal P";-^™= ^^atitude is due to sev 
which preceded .t. No small ^ ^^^,.( 

:ow wUhin sound of my --- * „ the ability and 
to enlighten the !>«-« S n^-'" .^,^,;„„, diplomacy, 
tWng patriotism f^iy^'j^.^^^ ^'ut the few years .. 

wars, not only of "f '^^ 

diately succeeding. (Note B.) ■ and aspu 

But, if we duly cherish ou, own P ^^ ^^^ ^^.^^ 

.eet the just "P-'^""";:;!; ! .ource of historical i 
ought to exhaust every .ema.mn„ 



tration on such important points. Further and without doubt 
successful efforts can be made to exhibit the true causes and 
consequences of the leading measures of that age of trial, 
and to give to the interesting events which have followed, 
under the General Government, even to the present times, 
their true " form and pressure." On this point much is 
justly expected from the manuscripts of the venerated Mad- 
ison, whose immediate, elevated, and long agency in those 
political scenes, gave him opportunities of knowledge pos- 
sessed by few if any others. Considering the violent party 
agitations which have prevailed during most of that period ; 
the history of it, if left to accident or prejudice ; to only 
single-handed effort, one-sided knowledge, and one-eared 
justice ; to the mere passions of the moment, or the calum- 
nies, colorings, and distortions of the day ; other nations would 
be led to form very unfavorable views of the character and 
tendencies of our Government, and posterity would be 
tempted most unjustly to believe, but for the host of bless- 
ings transmitted to them, that their fathers were little better 
than the "convicts" they have so often been called in re- 
proach by some of their worthless libellers. 

Let it then become a prominent part of our duty as mem- 
bers of this society, to strip from the statue of Truth all 
such meretricious and false disguises. Let it not be said of 
us, when inquirers for facts, as Aristophanes describes the 
Athenians, 

" No matter what the offence, 

" Be 't great or small, 

" The cry is tyranny, conspiracy." 

But, when we enter the sacred temple of History, let us 
put off the partisan of the day, whether in religion or poli- 
tics, as well as discard our favorite theories of philosophy 
and political economy, and seek faithfully to do justice to 
the most calumniated. 

Let us seek to correct mistakes in fact ; remove errors in 
opinion ; preserve important discoveries and arts from per- 
2 



10 

version or loss ; illustrate the dark and doubtful in character, 
and preserve from the corroding tooth of time every thing 
among us which may be useful and honorable to the land of 
our birth and adoption as well as to the human race. In this 
last undertaking, acting in some degree as impartial judges on 
the bench of posterity, we should investigate with ermine un- 
soiled, and with all those loft}^ attributes worthy the goddess 
who holds the equal scales among mortals. 

Hence our scrutiny cannot be pushed too wide or too far. 
We must take neither Catholic nor Protestant accounts of 
religious events, neither federal nor republican views of po- 
litical measures and motives, without due allowance for pre- 
judice, and due comparisons of probabilities and conflicting 
testimonials. In fine, we should hold the mirror up to facts 
and nature alone, and invoke every just and honorable feel- 
ing to aid us in judgment on the long array of the past. 

The particular topics of inquiry in this branch of our his- 
tory are so numerous that, notwithstanding their interest to 
many, the fear of being tedious must prevent me from pre- 
senting a special enumeration of them. (Note C.) 

The next most appropriate object of research, and which is 
intimately connected with the other as a ramification of it, 
would be the progress of our foreign relations, whether on 
this or the eastern continent. All the archives in relation to 
them are peculiarly connected with the capital of the Union, 
and the means afforded here for the correction of errors, by 
intercourse wath the distinguished representatives of other 
Powers, or by correspondence at home and abroad with per- 
sons able to communicate valuable information, are une- 
qualled. 

United with this are extraordinary facilities for throwing 
more light on our early history while dependent on some of 
those Powers, and of drawing from their official records, 
through their courteousness and liberality, much that may be 
useful, not only in respect to our general concerns, but the 



11 

local annals of various States on this continent, of whatever 
foreign origin. 

To all these could be very appropriately added, at this cen- 
tral point, collections of specimens in botany, mineralogy, and 
conchology, as well as in several other branches of natural 
history. Our treasures of marl and of lime, from shells and 
stones, which may thus be explored and flung open to profita- 
ble use in agriculture and the arts, are probably unrivalled. 

The whole range of Indian history, and the illustration of 
it by their relics and traditions, come likewise most naturally 
within our appropriate province, situated at the centre of the 
civil control over our Indian concerns, and at the common 
point of resort and intercommunication for every important 
tribe. 

What was the origin of these numerous tenants of our for- 
ests ? What were once their arts ? What do their overgrown 
mounds and scattered fragments of ruined cities, their ro- 
mantic traditions, and, among the wildest, some recently 
given to the world by the enterprising Catlin — what do these 
and the hidden treasures in their singular languages and scat- 
tered hieroglyphics and paintings indicate ? What do their 
historical wampums — their mysterious quipos or Peruvian 
knots develop to the patient inquirer ? 

What do they all teach of their destinies in by-gone times, 
when they had neither well-balanced government nor the art 
of printing to preserve the annals and grandeur of their vari- 
ous careers ? 

What disasters drove or what advantages tempted them to 
erect cities on heights of the Andes, above the tops of the 
loftiest mountains in our own regions ? When and what earth- 
quakes or other physical convulsions by winds and tides may 
have separated this great continent from Europe, Asia, or 
Africa ? What false or bloody religions may have depressed 
and deluded them ? What inscrutable doom has hung and 
still hangs over their decay and dispersion r' 



12 

Such inquiries as these, if less useful to provide historical 
materials to advance the prosperity of this and future ages, 
are yet objects of liberal curiosity, and debts of gratitude and 
justice, if not of atonement, in some cases, due to the races 
which preceded us in these fair and fertile regions. Amid 
the atrocities almost inseparable from the condition of savage 
life, those races frequently displayed great hospitality and 
heroic devotion to our fathers. Their history, thus far, has 
been too often written only by enemies ; and when, as some- 
times is the fact, the authors were smarting under their bar- 
barities, frankness requires us to admit that they have occa- 
sionally proved unjust if not vindictive. 

If King Philip, the great sachem of Pokanoket, could have 
stood on the summit of Mount Hope and stetched his eyes 
over the rich rivers and beautiful bays of his Narragansett 
dominions, and not have sighed at abandoning them, nor, 
amid stifled regrets and pangs at parting, have fought to de- 
fend them, he would have been unworthy his station, and 
have justly deserved the execrations of history. 

We, ourselves, may yet learn useful admonitions from the 
annals of even such savage examples, if well considered ; 
and be proud while lamenting, as we ought, their ignorance, 
superstitions, and cruelty, if we, when menaced by invasion 
from abroad, or by intestine divisions at home, may be able 
to imitate the exhortations and sacrifices to union, the brave- 
ry and prudence, if not, in some respects, lofty patriotism 
of such men as Philip and Tecumseh ! 

But my main purpose on the present occasion is to advert 
more fully to some of the deductions and influences to be 
derived from historical researches like those previously alluded 
to, and pursued, with the spirit enjoined, into the true charac- 
ter of American aff"airs in general, and especially of our own 
Government and people. The lessons of wisdom which our 
annals, when rightly read, are thus inculcating, constitute 
their most conspicuous excellence. 



IS 

It is thus that history becomes the useful schoohnaster 
of every age. Its pupils are the living — its lessons the mon- 
uments of the dead, in the record of their principles and their 
deeds. Their virtues are held up for adoption ; their vices 
for abhorrence ; their errors for correction and warning ; 
their glory in arts or arms, in literature, in the sciences, or 
government,^for admiration and useful emulation. 

What then has been the peculiar influence of the events 
which have transpired here since Columbus daringly turned 
the prow of his vessel into an unknown ocean, and first be- 
held the shores of a new world darkening the horizon ? or 
even since the pilgrim fathers stepped on the rocky beach of 
the East ? or the chivalrous Smith landed at Jamestown, sur- 
rounded by a new and admiring race ? 

What has been the result on America itself? What on 
Europe ? What on the world at large ? 

In tracing these inquiries into minute details, it is useful 
to seek all which has been disclosed that is important as to 
commerce and the arts, or letters and arms, and the various 
and splendid works of nature, as well as human rights and 
government, and the last and best hopes of man in religion 
and the future improvement of our race. In brief, we may 
ask. What does history teach us has been the true philosophy 
of the whole ? 

By the discovery of a continent, before unknown, there 
burst upon the numerous races inhabiting its forests, the 
knowledge, so marvellous to their untutored minds, of the 
existence of the eastern hemisphere, and of a people whose 
civilization made them appear at first to be demi-gods. This 
was soon followed by some faint conception of the useful 
character of the reviving arts and letters, as well as of a reli- 
gion, calculated, one would have supposed, if properly dif- 
fused, not to lead to the extirpation, conquest, or degrada- 
tion of the aborigines, but rather to their elevation to all 
which might rival the loftiest and best in the old world. 



14 

It might at that crisis have been fairly hoped that the change 
on the Indians themselves would have been more salutary 
and glorious than even on the Europeans. But, notwithstand- 
ing the brilliant visions which illuminated their horizon, his- 
tory has blasted almost every fond anticipation indulged, and 
has presented the destinies of the former inhabitants of the 
new continent under one almost indiscriminate and total 
eclipse. It is true that Eliot and " the good Las Casas" 
early preached the cross of Christ among them. A Brainard 
and others have since perished in the cause of Indian reform, 
burning with enthusiasm to cast down their false gods. Schools 
have been sometimes established among them ; agriculture 
and the arts often encouraged. But a desolating blight seems 
to have spread over the whole native race, crushing the ex- 
pectations of the philanthropist, saddening the heart of the 
Christian, and almost extinguishing further hopes of great 
benefits from those exertions which a sense of duty and the 
calls of humanity still prompt us to persevere in making. 

Mortifying as this has been to the pride of more enlightened 
human reason, and a purer religion, engaged in the civil- 
ization of the savages, it is almost equally mortifying that 
few can agree about the principal causes of these repeated 
failures. Probably they have been many and various, (note 
D,) but the discussion of them would occupy much space; 
and, amid all the errors and wrongs as well as commendable 
efforts of two or three centuries on this lamentable subject, 
the only useful deduction from their history which time will 
now permit me to notice, is, that before any thing permanently 
beneficial can be effected for them, above all, and beyond all, 
must they be induced to co-operate together, and, burying 
former animosities and revenges, to unite heartily as one 
people, in all the great general relations of society. 

This alone will afford leisure, taste, and resources for real 
civilization. They have long been a living monument, we 
will not say of the judgments of Heaven, but certainly of the 



15 

folly consequent on divisions among the same race into paltry 
tribes, and, like most of the clans of olden time, wasting their 
mutual means and energies in mutual aggression, instead of 
finding leisure or cherishing propensities for the pursuits of 
peace and national improvement. 

Perhaps, in the wisdom of Providence, they have in this 
respect been designed as beacons to warn us from the paths of 
division and ruin ; and the best philosophy of their history to 
us, and the most useful lesson to be extracted from it for them, 
is probably the importance, not only of suitable education in 
arts as well as in letters, but of union in governments, and 
union in efforts for common prosperity, rather than a blind 
indulgence in jealousies of each other, and a perseverance 
equally relentless and fatal in border hostilities. 

But, leaving the influence of Europe upon the original in- 
habitants of America, their past fortunes, as well as future 
prospects, what weal or wo does history prove that the dis- 
covery of this country has in return been the means of con- 
ferring on the rest of mankind ? 

It would be extremely difficult to calculate with accuracy 
either the stimulus or expansion given to the human mind 
wherever civilization prevailed, by only the announcement of 
the ascertained existence of a new world. Imagination had 
before painted some islands in the blue west, like the Atlan- 
tides of Plato ! Tradition, in the north, if not history, had 
also spoken of Greenland, and such emigrations as that of 
Madock from Wales to regions remote and unknown. 

Notwithstanding the denunciations of the Vatican, astron- 
omy too had dared to speculate on the formation and charac- 
ter of the earth as a planet, so as to fill such souls as Co- 
lumbus with enthusiasm for the search of new continents, or 
new routes to older and distant kingdoms. But now fancy, 
fable, hypothesis, tradition, were all to be lost in a glorious 
and astounding reality ! A new world, vast in extent, abun- 
dant in population, and gorgeous with fertility and gold, was 



16 

laid open to the admiring eyes of the eastern hemisphere ! What 
rich themes for the historian ! What a range for the geogra- 
pher, naturalist, and adventurer ! W^hat visions for the poet ! 
What fresh incentives and materials for commerce ! What a 
theatre for the philanthropist. 

In the more rapid revival of literature and wonderful ex- 
tension of foreign trade, but still more in the progress of 
wealth and intelligence among the lower classes, as well as 
of political rights, and a reformed religion over considerable 
portions of Europe, since that magnificent discovery, no doubt 
exists that much is justly to be ascribed to the influences de- 
rived from that remarkable event. Especially must it be so if 
coupled with the subsequent exploration and settlement of 
America, thus including her bright example since, as well as 
her strong impulses at first. 

Beside the general expansion, influences, and impulses thus 
imparted almost every where and to every subject or pursuit, 
many important articles of commerce were flung open to the 
eastern world, and some useful seeds, plants, and animals 
were transferred to improve and enrich the great discoverers. 
A single American vegetable, the humble potato, has 
alone more than repaid Europe, in real wealth and comfort, 
for all the expenses of the discovery, and seems destined to 
prove a greater blessing to mankind than the whole of the 
precious ores, which attracted so strongly the first voyagers, 
or which have since been drawn from the prolific mines of 
the south. 

But, such topics sink in importance before those improve- 
ments in the civil and political condition of mankind which 
have become the great characteristic as well as glory of this 
western hemisphere. Certain it is, that, from the first visit 
to its shores, or, at all events, from the earliest durable occu- 
pation of the territory which now composes these United 
States, America was regarded by many as peculiar in its des- 
tinies, in connexion with the governments east of the Atlan- 



17 

tic, and as fitted, from its distance, attractions, and vas, 
resources, if not in time to react upon and regenerate Europe 
itself, at least to drain it of some of its most useful population, 
and become the asylum of the persecuted and oppressed of 
all nations. 

Whatever may have been the comparative physical powers 
of its native inhabitants, and whether its vast territory, moun- 
tains, rivers, and lakes — its condors and mammoths — were 
diminutive, and hence, as Bulfon and some others supposed, 
the European man was likely to degenerate here, it is hardly 
necessary at this day to discuss. Notwithstanding any such 
impressions then, this country soon became, not only a ref- 
uge for the distressed, whether driven into exile by the ordi- 
nary calamities of social life, or by fanaticism, bigotry, and 
intolerance in religion, or by the vindictive bitterness of po- 
litical hostility, but the chosen abode of myriads of the best 
and bravest spirits of that chivalrous age. In sarcasms and 
taunts, by our defamers, we have since been often vilified as a 
" colony of outcasts," whose " Adam and Eve emigrated from 
Newgate." But, yielding that a very few, as in all new coun- 
tries may sometimes have " strayed in error's path," yet, the 
great mass emigrating hither are well known to have been the 
enlightened and patriotic — such men as " know their rights, 
and knowing dare maintain ;" having equal readiness and fit- 
ness in both body and mind to encounter the perils of inclement 
seas, frozen shores, and ferocious savages, rather than submit 
longer to the endurance of the bitter oppressions inflicted on 
them in Europe by the parasites of power and the tyrants 
who upheld them. 

In brief, as history has amply shown by their wonderful 
success, they were men suited not only at first to subdue a 
wilderness and cope triumphantly with barbarians, but after- 
wards to wage a victorious struggle with bigotry, persecution, 
and usurpation, from their former homes. It is true, and their 
3 



18 

descendants have never otherwise pretended, that not many 
of them were devotees of the fine arts, or the fashionable, or 
the titled, from the purlieus of St. James's or Versailles. 
Without derogating from the proper merits of any of these 
classes in their proper spheres, or under other political sys- 
tems, our ancestors are conceded to have been mostly homines 
res agenda^ men truly fitted and thoroughly devoted to the 
practical affairs of life. But it must not be forgotten that they 
were, at the same time, men intelligent and intrepid in mat- 
ters of government and religion, as well as in ordinary busi- 
ness ; and being so, that they were such men as ought to, and 
will, by their unconquerable constancy and skill, not only ad- 
vance their fortunes and foil opposition, but virtually govern 
the world, whenever the world is enlightened, moral, and 
free. 

They will do this, not because ambitious and designing, but 
because best qualified to defend the hearth and the altar when 
in jeopardy, and, by useful arts and honest industry as well 
as by arms, to build up great and prosperous communities. 
Like Themistocles, they and many of their descendants could 
proudly say, " I am unable to play on the flute, but I know 
how to make a large state from a small one." Humble as 
some of their general traits of character may appear to many, 
the history of passing events, as well as of the past, shows 
that their labors have not been lost on Europe any more than 
on America, and that, by means of them the latter has gradu- 
ally become not only the land of plenty, but of promise, to 
large portions of the other empires of the earth. 

From Cromwell and Hampden, who attempted in vain to 
emigrate hither ; and from Locke and Berkeley, who gen- 
erously labored to improve our institutions, as well as from 
the numbers, whether Independents, Huguenots, or Catholics, 
who, undaunted, actually encountered every physical suffer- 
ing to escape from w hat were considered worse evils at home 
of a religious and political character — from their whole lie- 



19 

roic efforts, sacrifices, and triumphs, a spirit or a change in 
society has moved over the face of this great continent, 
and at last recrossed the Atlantic. 

It is now pervading the best parts of the old world, and 
though, since the discovery of America, it has been much 
assisted by lessons derived from antiquity, and much by the 
arts, and principles, of several modern nations in western 
Europef calculated to renovate and improve, yet this great 
change has been more emphatically and immediately the 
result #f exertions, experiments, and example here. 

This spirit or change relates chiefly to the wider difl'usion 
of civil and religious liberty. 

The peculiar teachings of our history consist chiefly in 
pointing out the causes and preservatives of this spirit, its 
peculiarities, lis proper limitations and guards, its conse- 
quences in benefits and glories, its perils, securities, and 
hopes ! 

A few words as to some of its causes. When we look 
back to the great experiment which has been moving on- 
ward here for two centuries, it is at once discovered that 
little of our success has depended on physical advantages. 
The southern portions of this continent have exhibited as 
mighty rivers, as fertile plains, and lofty mountains, and 
genial climates, as in the north and west ; and, without wish- 
ing to draw comparisons either invidious or derogatory, we 
are forced to trace the differences of progress in arts, 
power, and government, to much higher sources. 

In truth, the causes of the great changes now under con- 
sideration have been imbedded much deeper in mind than 
in matter, and been accompanied by some of the most re- 
markable moral phenomena since the creation. 

The condition of many of the first settlers here led them 
at once to commence, if it did not impose on them the ne- 
cessity of a thorough course of training for self-government. 



• 20 

Hence, most of their rulers were, from the first, voluntarily 
chosen, and it was not till some stability in business and 
progress in wealth were attained, chiefly by their own ex- 
ertions, that many of the colonial establishments were 
deemed of sufficient importance to tempt from abroad the 
interference of much regulation, domination, and persecution, 
in the shape of government. But, the neglected condition 
of their first establishments ; the daring character, of the 
early emigrants ; their habits of self-possession and self-legis- 
lation for most exigencies ; the entire freedom of tiought, 
feeling, and opinions they gradually cherished, and the fee- 
bleness of delegated power when imposed from so great a 
distance as Europe, kept up a constant education for inde- 
pendence, which must, without any temerity, or a tax on tea, 
or the odium of stamp duties, have been consummated on 
some other early occasion, whenever sufficient strength and 
numbers were obtained, and any slight provocation occurred 
to cause an explosion. " Coming events" had for some time 
" cast their shadow before." Their institutions and habits 
had made men bold, but not bad ; hardy, intelligent, equal, 
plain-dealing, and just, though enterprising and shrewd ; 
had promoted the employment of the faculties in useful ac- 
tion rather than the embellishment of them, and had reared 
gallant soldiers, intelligent farmers, industrious and scientific 
mechanics, and practical lawyers for leaders rather than 
mere scholars, or only the sometimes weak inheritors of 
office. 

Such leaders, too, were not simply the Brutuses or Catos 
of antiquity, but they were the compatriots of multitudes 
imbued like themselves with greater useful knowledge, with 
a higher code of morals and purer religion, and with fac- 
ulties sharpened and strengthened by the experience in 
government and improvement in arts of two thousand more 
years. 



21 

The institutions established, as well as the principles 
cherished, all, therefore, tended to a new, radical, and great 
result. Unlike most other people in their origin, they ex- 
perienced here no long infancy of ignorance, or barbarism, 
but at once started into being, elevated by and enjoying 
the aid of all the useful improvements as well as learning 
and morals of the most civilized nations of the known world. 

It is manifest, likewise, that they brought with them, early 
as on board the May Flower, or late as the arrival of Penn, 
the elements of future resistance to every species of tyranny 
over the human mind. Though some of their views were 
yet crude, and, as might be expected, all the rights of man 
were not so well understood as after the struggles and popu- 
lar victories of two more centuries ; still, the stern resolve to 
be no longer " a mere shadow of what others say and do," in 
either politics, religion, or manners, had distinctly appeared 
in the very causes of the emigration of most of them. The 
increasing wealth, as well as education and rights of the lower 
classes in portions of Europe, had previously, though gradu- 
ally, been developing there for one or two centuries, under 
every species of thraldom from official opposition in most of 
her monarchical governments. A settlement in America pre- 
sented not only an asylum to those classes when wronged, 
whether persecuted for opinion or cloven down in some con- 
test for freedom at home, but a theatre on which their theo- 
retic views of liberty of conscience, and equal rights, removed 
so far from the strong arm of despotic power, would sooner 
be allowed a fair trial, without incurring the danger of mar- 
tyrdom, or of perishing on the scaffold with such men as Sid- 
ney, Russel, and Vane. It was more distant, also, from the 
blandishments, the wiles, and the seductive appliances of a 
court, and was soon surrounded and sustained chiefly by 
spirits of a kindred training with their own. But, without 
dwelling longer on such details, the general features of our 
whole history previous to the Revolution, evince that Ameii- 



23 

ca, besides being a retreat for the persecuted, was regarded 
at first and to the last as a favored abode of the hardy and in- 
dustrious, and the peculiar resort, not of dignitaries in church 
or state, or drones of any kind, but of those devoted to new 
enterprises and lucrative commerce, and who would dare to 
settle on a cold, inhospitable, and iron-bound coast, as readily 
as on the sunny and fertile banks of the Delaware, the Savan- 
nah, or the Mississippi, if they could but plant quiet and free 
homes among the snow and granite, and fish up a profitable 
livelihood from the depths of the ocean — trap the beaver 
among his mountains and lakes, or hunt the whale with success 
at either the equator or the poles. In fine, whether at the 
north, the centre, or the south, it was considered the home, 
as it is now the glory chiefly of the middling and laborious 
classes. These classes, accustomed to rely on their own ener- 
gies in private life, and smarting under taxation, intolerance, 
and monopolies, in their former abodes, aspired to breathe 
the freer air of some other region, where, though remote, un- 
friended, and solitary — though strangers at first, and environ- 
ed by almost every species of peril, they might be governed 
in public life also, by their own judgments, as well as by their 
own interests and useful laws. Most of the emigrants, and 
their descendants, were likewise persons very equal in rank, 
business, property, and education, and such mainly as felt the 
strongest attachment to the great republican doctrines of lib- 
erty, as taught by the school of Harrington and Hampden. 
Above all, they were men deeply impressed with religious 
principle as a guide, and their constant efforts were to acquire 
for themselves, and transmit, unimpaired, to others, a full 
knowledge of their duties, no less than a full enjoyment of 
their rights and powers, as beings free, enlightened, account- 
able, and immortal. In these last circumstances are concen- 
trated two cardinal and conservative principles of their whole 
system. They are the principles which, fundamental in their 
nature, chiefly sustained them before, as well as during, the 



23 

crisis of the great struggle for independence, and which have 
since contributed most essentially to push forward our country 
with such rapidity to its present unexampled condition of 
prosperity. Those principles were the promotion and indis- 
pensable necessity, under their free institutions, of a high de- 
gree of practical education and sound morals. Without these, 
whatever other numerous advantages our ancestors possessed 
in their Saxon origin — their general equality — soils so exu- 
berant — fisheries so prolific, and navigable waters so exten- 
sive, they either would have been incapable of self-govern- 
ment, from ignorance of the true extent of their rights and the 
proper safeguards for them by means of suitable constitutions 
and laws; or they would have become so impracticable, di- 
vided, and weak, as to have passed under a foreign yoke. 0^ / 
they would have proved so unprincipled and craven as to have 
bartered the substance for the shadow, and accepted, at the 
Revolution, if not chains, yet an unequal compromise with 
the parent country, for the aggrandizement of a few, which 
would have forever branded them with dishonor. Or since, 
as well as previously, they would, without just pretence, have 
made claims and resorted to ferocious outrages on individuals 
or feebler nations, from whatever cause obnoxious, which 
would have destroyed the confidence of the world in their in- 
tegrity, and, if not leading to counter revolutions or restora- 
tions, would probably have wrecked many of their most valu- 
able institutions. But, elevated and ameliorated by those 
principles, they were always men as different from Romulus 
and Remus, and their wolfish aggressions on the neighboring 
people, and from the Barbarossas of more Moslem eras, as >vt ^ 
were the Christian from the Pagan codes of morals, or the 
nature of the education of the Puritans from that of banditti 
and buccaneers. 

Nor ever since (we may justly exult) has the spirit of 
plunder or conquest been allowed to stain a single page of our 
annals. On the contrary, we see every where, and in every 



24 

thing, the astonishing results of that practical education, and 
those sound morals, operating on a people so fortunately 
situated. From the very outset it taught them the importance 
not only of free schools, libraries, and colleges, as means or 
instruments for advancement — but what precedes even them 
in time and utility — strict parental discipline at the fire-side, 
thorough acquisition of trades and professions, and the bene- 
ficial instructions of the pulpit and the forum. 

It taught them also to make actual experiments as well as 
improvements on what had already been learned, or, in some 
sense, to combine study and practice, by mingling in the 
administration of justice as jurors; exercising fearlessly the 
right of voting at the polls ; and all, or nearly all, taking a 
constant and legal, as well as large part in the management 
of those miniature republics, consisting of districts and towns, 
as well as in the disposal of county and state affairs. 

Their system of free-schools was generally one of the 
strongest foundation-stones of the whole fabric ; and we can 
trace in their legislative records, the establishment of them as 
early as the first twenty-five years of their settlement. Most 
persons, though childless, wisely considered their property and 
persons so fully protected and benefited by the education of 
the children of others, as to make the tax for this purpose just 
and salutary. This system, in various ways, is believed to 
have since extended its ramifications or influences over most 
of the Union ; and though in some States yet unattempted 
in form, and in many yet deficient in attention to inculcate 
the elements of great moral and political truths as fully as a 
knowledge of mere letters, it has, with admirable retributive 
justice, called to its aid, in other States, all the taxes and 
penalties inflicted on the minor vices of society. (Note E.) 

But, besides these and much more of details connected 
with the origin and progress of elementary education here, 
and which, however interesting, want of time compels me to 
omit, our history exhibits a favorable change of late years 



26 

on the subject of books of useful knowledge, in their greater 
cheapness and multiplicity, as well as increased practical 
tendency. 

The libraries of this country, whether public or private, 
are also becoming larger and more valuable, and the progress 
of invention by stereotype printing, by improvements in the 
manufacture of paper, and by steam presses, has contributed 
much to facilitate the acquisition of knowledge, for both the 
ordinary and more select purposes of life. The daily press 
has thus become another most powerful auxiliary in teaching ; 
and the number of newspapers in America is computed to 
have increased so as to be more than half as great as that 
which all the wealth, population, ahd^intelligence of the whole 
of Europe now circulate. While on some subjects all man- 
kind feel and act much alike, our ancestors were wisely 
aware that a conventional mode of thinking on others is often 
formed very early, and in great strength, by books and asso- 
ciates. 

Hence arose in part their great sagacity, foresight, and 
diligence in respect to early education ; and thus, while in 
the view of the unlettered Indian, we, as they did, by our 
system of education, spoil his children for the chase and the 
inclination for interminable and ferocious war, we shall, it 
is to be hoped, always continue by means of it to spoil our 
own children for most of the purposes of either sloth, slavery, 
or despotism ; and while, by proper elementary works, by 
competent teachers, and liberal pecuniary encouragement, 
we shall be able to point in every village school to such 
spoiled children as our Franklins and Hancocks once were, 
a constant progress will be secured, as well in the useful arts 
of life as in the preservation and improvement of our liberties. 
In another branch of common instruction this country has 
advanced so far beyond most others, as to become a model 
for foreigers to examine and imitate. Thus, under the in- 
fluence of just sentiments of humanity for even the lowest 



26 

of our erring race, some of the States, and many private as- 
sociations, have pushed education, literary and religious, not 
only into the alms-house, but the very cell of the criminal 
— and while enuring the body to habits of useful industry 
and accustoming the appetites to temperance, it has been at- 
tempted to superadd hopes of durable reformation, by in- 
creasing the knowledge of the rights of others, and strength- 
ening the sense of duty to respect these rights. The means 
of higher education have likewise long existed here, and of 
late been much enlarged, though, for reasons hereafter de- 
tailed, they have usually been deemed of secondary im- 
portance. Our practical intelligence always taught us to rely 
on the skilful surgeon rather than the mechanic, for ampu- 
tating a broken limb ; and though the mere literary classes 
have rather been regarded as the capital or ornament of the 
column than the column itself, which supports the social edi- 
fice, their labors have done much to solace, refine, and stim- 
ulate others, and often, as in the case of Davy and Napier, 
Black and Newton, have helped essentially to advance even 
the common arts and improvements of mankind. 

Sound learning and true liberty have thus justly been de- 
scribed as leaning on each other for support; and if any ten- 
dency has ever been indulged here in public feeling towards 
any kind of monarchy, it has been as much the real, though 
unacknowledged monarchy of the learned professions and 
men of letters, as of the middling classes. The evident 
leaning, however, of the former class, has of late been, as 
they become more numerous, to spread wider among the lat- 
ter, and to mingle more intimately with them, in practical 
studies and active pursuits, so as to begin to form rather a 
real republic of letters, more broad and equal, like our civil 
rights, and higher in the estimation of the whole community. 
All its members are thus more inclined to be, and to be 
acknowledged as actual ivorking men, in their appropriate 
spheres ; nor do most of them deem it at all derogatory to 



27 

labor there quite as hard as those who guide the plough or 
wield the sledge and hammer. 

If it be asked wh^- our history has not been more prolific 
in institutions well calculated to aid in attainments of the 
very highest character in polite literature and the severe 
sciences, and what have been the consequences on our 
national character, and the progress of society here ? Wc 
answer, that, without detracting at all from the utility of these 
pursuits, in proper circumstances, and by people of affluence 
or leisure, it must be manifest (and no American need blush 
at the acknowledgment) that the whole fabric of our political 
system has been, and still is, in respect to education, found- 
ed on the diffusion of elementary knowledge more widely 
among the people at large, rather than on the promotion of 
greater acquirements within narrow limits. It seeks, like- 
wise, to bring inforniation immediately useful to every door, 
and to tempt all to listen and learn, rather than to carry 
what is abstruse or ornamental into the higher circles alone, 
or to encourage those pursuits which, by their elegance or 
refinement in taste, are calculated principally to amuse the 
learned or fashionable, or to employ the leisure of the wealthy 
in an old and dense population. 

This policy has been better suited to our youthful and 
equal institutions. It comported well with our condition in 
regard to the cultivation of vast and fertile regions of terri- 
tory yet unimproved, and with a rapidly-increasing popula- 
tion, requiring first to be supplied with sound practical in- 
formation on political rights and duties, with agricultural 
skill, and with manufactures and mechanic arts of prime ne- 
cessity. Hence, though science, here as elsewhere, has 
more than once " walked the furrow with the consul swain," 
yet, in the first instance, and no astonishment need be en- 
tertained abroad at the fact, we have generally (and com- 
mendably) been much more eager to become good axemen, 
ploughmen, and swordsmen, than mere book-men. We have 



28 

been more ambitious in such a stage of our national career 
to fill the hive of industry with new swarms, ready to distil 
honey and defend it, rather than to consume it. What have 
been some of the most striking consequences from this policy 
concerning education and equality of rights, as exhibited in 
our history, and more especially in later years ? The whole 
mind of society, instead of the intellects of a few, has thus 
been excited. We have, in one sense, fostered a levelling 
principle ; but it has been to level up, rather than down — by 
raising the low, rather than lowering the high. 

The general influence of such a system has been to promote 
utility, instead of ornament or display ; to ask the ciii bono as 
to every project, private or public ; to advance the comforts 
rather than the luxuries of life ; to gratify the wants of the 
many rather than the caprices of the few ; to carry " plenty 
through a smiling land" to every fireside, rather than the means 
of voluptuousness to the rich alone ; to improve morals, school 
the feelings severely, and respect the decencies of society, 
more than embellish manners ; to encourage simplicity of life, 
directness of purpose, and purity as well as manliness and in- 
flexibility of conduct ; to strengthen rather than to polish, even 
at the risk sometimes of roughness, if not rudeness ; and in 
lieu of eff^erainacy or an extraordinary mass of mental ac- 
quirements, to promote decision of character, and secure to all 
the perfect knowledge and use of a few great and simple truths 
in politics, religion, and civil rights, so as in all respects to 
form useful, " high-minded men," instead of " starred and span- 
gled courts." 

History shows that the public policy forced on us by the 
same salutary influences, has been to cultivate peace, com- 
merce, and mutual benevolence with all nations, rather than 
to indulge in arms or conquest, and to rely on reason and jus- 
tice for our rights more than on the arts of diplomacy or the 
ultima ratio regiim. But, at the same time, we have done 
this without hazarding any unwise neglect of the latter, or 



29 

declining a resort to force when required by honor or duty — 
reason before arms, but arms before disgrace. It shows, also, 
that though originally planted in most cases amidst idolatry 
and heathenism, we became, by the surpassing excellence of 
our political systems, as far removed from the propagation, by 
Mahometan violence, of the divine tenets of the Bible, though 
anxious peacefully to send them for the conversion of all 
nations, as we are removed from the fierce Corsair spirit of 
plunder, or the lust of warlike empire, which have so often 
inflamed and devastated much of the earth. 

Hence have sprung our leisure, taste, and success in such 
numerous improvements in the arts of common life. In the best 
and widest pursuit of man, what various experiments on new 
seeds, crops, and dressings, on new farming-tools and new do- 
mestic animals, have penetrated almost every glade and moun- 
tain, and threaded almost every stream from the St. Croix to 
the Sabine ! 

Among the models which crowd our patent office — I should 
say which once crowded it — that pride and emblem of Ameri- 
can ingenuity whose recent loss we all deplore — the plough, 
the harrow, the threshing-machine, the winnowing-mill, the 
hoe, and the churn, with a myriad of other instruments, im- 
proved or invented to facilitate the various operations of agri- 
cultural industry, filled a large space, and showed strongly the 
practical tendency to absorb here so great a share of intellect- 
ual exertion, in the accomplishment of only useful results. 
How many have thus achieved in substance what Swift pro- 
nounced to be more praiseworthy than all the labors of mere 
politicians — the salutary, if not splendid improvement, of ma- 
king two blades of grass grow where only one grew before. 

The mechanic arts, as connected with agriculture and manu- 
factures, have also profited greatly by this general impulse of 
the public mind. It is true that many of the greatest changes 
in the machinery for spinning and weaving have originated 
elsewhere ; but they have been readily adopted, and much 



30 

improved, in this country ; and, aided by the wonderful results 
from the cotton-gin, whose invention and merits are exclusive- 
ly American, have caused an entire revolution in the house- 
hold economy of many of the States, and studded thousands 
of our waterfalls with thrifty villages. Performing here, by 
machinery, in the cotton manufactory alone, what a century 
ago would have required the manual labor of at least twenty 
millions of people, we have with avidity seized not only on 
that but all other labor-saving inventions, and done our full 
share in bettering and increasing what has in various ways 
contributed nearly as much as the introduction of printing, or 
gunpowder, to advance the wealth, comfort, intelligence, and 
consequent privileges of the middling classes among mankind. 
The daughters of the mechanic or farmer, by such results, 
are able to wear ornaments which royalty would once have 
envied, and by other discoveries and improvements of a re- 
cent date, are decked with laces from our own sea-island 
cottons, of which both the fineness and elegance exceed all, 
either known or fancied, by the Sapphos or Cornelias of 
antiquity. The same impulse has led us to push z-esearches 
still more deeply into commercial enterprises with distant 
regions — whether to the frozen ocean, "the furthest Ind," 
or the isles of the Pacific ; and whether to bring back rich 
returns for our ice and rocks in the East, or for the abun- 
dant staples of the South. But, above all, after devising nu- 
merous changes to facilitate intercourse at home by newly- 
planned bridges and improved roads and canals, this im- 
pulse has at last, as has been better said in substance else- 
where,* placed upon them and on navigable waters, not 
only fleeter and more capacious vehicles and vessels, but 
substituted for animal power and sails, through American as 
well as English perseverance and skill, an element which has 
outstripped the winds in speed, almost annihilated time and 
space, and seems destined to advance the progress of nearly 
every art which civilizes and enriches man. 
* Edinburgh Review. 



31 

This new power has been taught, also, to enter the work- 
shop and manufactory, as well as to course roads, rivers, and 
oceans — to speed the plough, the shuttle, and the spinning- 
wheel, as well as empty docks, excavate harbors, and plunge 
into the deepest mines. It is a curious historical fact that, 
though we are by some denied the merit of having first ap- 
plied steam with success to navigation, and are confessedly a 
less numerous, less wealthy, less commercial, and less scien- 
tific people than our competitors for this great improvement, 
there are now upon our various waters more than six hun- 
dred steamboats to their four or five hundred, and, from the 
large size of many of our vessels, a greater excess in pro- 
portion of tonnage employed in steam navigation. By the 
frigate Fulton, we were first, also, to apply it to purposes of 
war, that great theatre where, perhaps, its greatest powers 
may yet be developed. By a singular combination of me- 
chanical intelligence and skill, in several other instances 
we have converted philosophy into a means of security as 
well as wealth ; and if Franklin, alone, had lived, and dared, 
as he dared, and drawn, as he drew, the lightning of heaven 
harmless from the clouds, it would have been an epoch in 
useful inventions and practical application of science to the 
safety of social life which alone would have immortalized 
the country of his birth. Why are these themes so exhilara- ff^ 

ting and so engrossing to an American ? Not that he is boast- 
ful of being the discoverer of more new powers than others, 
though he has succeeded in their application to more new and 
useful purposes, and which last. Lord Bacon considered as 
almost equally commendable, while it is manifestly quite as 
beneficial ; nor merely that he filled your patent office with 
more than ten thousand models of inventions and improve- 
ments — but that he has done those, and at the same time suc- 
cessfully introduced numberless others, without patents, and 
without hesitation, from a peculiar characteristic of our peo- 
ple, growing out of their wide-spread and practical education, 



32 

evinced in their universal eagerness to better their condition 
— in their constant aspirations for advancement in the world — 
and in their readiness to adopt, at once, every advantage 
within their grasp, from regions however remote. Vanquish- 
ing all obstinate prejudices against novelty or innovation — 
existing too often still in benighted monarchies, and aided 
by the diversified origin of portions of our population, 
whether from the British islands, the Rhine, or the Alps, 
the Seine, the Baltic, or the Tagus, our liberality and 
tolerating spirit have thus sought to extract and cherish every 
excellence from every climate and government, in every sci- 
ence and art. This flexibility of disposition, without servilely 
aping the habits of any one nation, has contributed to convert 
the country into a sort of social Pantheon, to receive within 
its limits the professed advantages of all other people, and as 
recommended by the great author of the Novum Organum, to 
bring them all ad experimentum cruets. 

We are, in fact, the great laboratory of the world, to try 
every doubtful substance in the crucible. 

In this mode our progress in the useful arts as well as in 
government, has been much accelerated, without serious po- 
litical hazards or convulsions ; and our history has exhibited 
a feature from which still higher hopes of advancement 
among us hereafter may, with propriety, be indulged. 

Seizing, readily, on all the treasures scattered through the 
records of the last six thousand years, or discovered and 
gleaned, from time to time, by our enterprising commerce in 
every habitable quarter of the globe, we make the whole 
world, in some degree, tributaiy to our progress. We take 
our stoves and wooden pavements as quickly from Russia as 
our machinery from England. We drink our tea as agreeably 
coming from the worshippers of the Grand Lama, on the op- 
posite side of the globe, as if we brought it from Brazil ; and 
find our drugs as medicinal, and our figs as palatable from the 
Turk and the plains of Troy, as if they 'grew in Florida or 
Mexico. 



33 

We have drawn likewise for supplies of national names 
and examples, on Pagan as well as Christian — ancient as 
as well as modern — civilized and savage models, wherever 
we find any thing deemed worthy -of imitation. We seek 
all — visit all — imitate all — trade with all. We only ask if 
benefits can be received or conferred. In declaring our 
independence of foreign control, we never regarded our- 
selves as independent of either the commerce, arts, or litera- 
ture of the great commonwealth of all civilized people — nor 
independent, whether individually or collectively, of the 
duties of kindness and reciprocal interchange of advantages; 
but rather independent of any political domination not freely 
established by ourselves, independent in our systems of le- 
gislation, independent in our modes of thought and action, 
and independent, as it becomes us always to be, as well as 
unmindful, of the frowns of the rest of the world, while con- 
vinced that, in the cause of conferring the greatest good on 
the greatest number, we are engaged in a cause which con- 
science approves, and pursue it by means to which reason and 
virtue have long given their sanction. But, conscious, from 
the spiritual principle within, when not debased, that " men 
would be angels," and are often rashly aspiring, one of the 
great excellencies in our progress has been its general cau- 
tion and moderation, and its vigilance not to be misled by that 
ambitious and restless principle. Though aiming at almost 
every thing — attempting almost every thing — accomplishing 
almost every thing, practicable, yet we have still been regu- 
gulated by the severe training before alluded to — and have 
been restrained in most cases, however much has been said 
and speculated to the contrary, from wasting our resources 
and energies on impracticable schemes, attracted merely by 
their splendor or novelty. Whether mere day dreams of 
speculators as to moneyed enterprises at home, or enthusi- 
astic theories for new political crusades abroad have been 
4 



34 

urged upon us, we have generally looked in all things to 
the cardinal test of utility and safety; and, however the shore 
may be strewed with occasional wrecks, the great mass of so- 
ciety have not usually looked thus in vain. Trying if not ex- 
^jausting most of all that has yet been discovered — gleaning 
from all the known world — we are now, by the Southern ex- 
ploring expedition, if favorable opportunities offer, about to 
push still further our researches into unknown latitudes — 
and if not adding to the treasures of science in perfecting the 
researches of astronomers, geographers, and naturalists, at 
least to increase the extent and security of trade in old if not 
new channels — on old if not new objects — and to perform an 
act of justice to other nations in contributing our share to the 
laudable efforts hitherto made by a number of them in the 
great cause of discovery. At least we shall no longer be 
censured for holding back our common exertions, common 
contributions, and common sacrifices to advance the knowl- 
edge of the surface of the earth, and in that way to improve 
our species. (Note F.) 

This practical education, chastened and controlled as it has 
been in most cases by sound morals, has in fact rendered our 
history in many respects more like a picture of the imagina- 
tion than a representation of real life, as man has existed in 
other ages and under different institutions. 

Far be it from me to be understood as supposing that there 
has been no new impulse imparted elsewhere to the arts or 
to human rights since Vandal irruptions have ceased to over- 
whelm nations, and that no salutary progress is not making 
abroad in many governments by means of improved com- 
merce and better examples, in the increase of democratic 
principles — liberal ideas — useful inventions — or more widely 
diffused education. 

But my inquiries are limited, by the character of our so- 
ciety, solely to American history, and my claims in behalf of 
America or the United States in particular, are only to their 



35 

striking influences or reactions on Europe itself — to their 
more rapid progress in improvements merely useful — to their 
more solid foundations of equal liberty and more liberal and 
concentrated application of all that exists elsewhere of prac- 
tical profit and good for man at large, rather than the higher 
classes — than what has heretofore distinguished him in most 
other countries. 

During the century and a half which preceded the Revolu- 
tion, increasing, though under foreign restraint, from handfuls 
of feeble emigrants to a population of three millions, and 
opening respectable commercial intercourse abroad, we pene- 
trated with the axe and plough to the first mountain ridges of 
our extensive territory. Even this was deemed a marvel, 
and excited the envy and cupidity of others to check our 
prosperity, monopolize our trade, and control our progress. 

But, when emancipated from every species of interference 
from abroad, by achieving independence, and left to form 
those constitutions, establish those equal laws, which our 
condition justified, and to excite that enterpise and industry 
to operate more widely, which had already contributed so 
much to make us what we were, and to sanction all we hoped 
to be, history shows that, within about half a century, or 
little more than the moiety of the life of many an individual, 
that population proceeded to increase from three to fifteen 
millions, that territory more than doubled, and widened from 
the Atlantic and its declivities to the Pacific ; that foreign 
commerce augmented from a few thousand dollars in value 
yearly to over one hundred and fifty millions, each, of im- 
ports and exports; manufactures, released from colonial thral- 
dom, extended in many branches, not only to supply fully the 
domestic demand, but added several millions to our foreign 
trade ; agriculture bringing new staples to perfection, and, 
aided by mechanical ingenuity, furnished a raw material in 
cotton, for almost the whole of Europe as well as America ; 
provided ourselves, in a large degree, with many of the 



36 

other essentials of life, such as salt, iron, sugar, and wool- 
lens, and scattered comfort and civilization, not only from 
the seaboard to the Alleganies, but from the AUeganies to 
the great monarch of rivers, and from him rapidly westward, 
till, ere long, it must reach the Rocky mountains, if not the 
Western ocean. Within the same brief period, that history 
describes us to the rest of mankind as having created a 
navy, secondary in size and efficiency to only two or three 
in the world ; as having formed and sustained various in- 
stitutions of enviable excellence, and done more to illustrate 
and perfect political economy than half thei ages and authors 
which preceded us, because, uniting in our system the prac- 
tical man and philosopher, and making one co-operate with 
the other in furnishing facts for science, and science for 
facts. 

We have also conducted triumphantly several foreign wars 
and negotiations, and discharged all the burdens of one to 
two hundred millions of national debt, incurred in securing 
our independence and subsequent national privileges, as 
well as in enlarging our territory and building up all our 
inestimable institutions and great works of public conveni- 
ence or improvement. Last, but not least, besides render- 
ing common the use of written constitutions for the safety 
of human rights, in almost every quarter of the globe, not 
merely rights political, but rights civil and social, and well 
adapted to secure the whole against the causes and from the 
consequences of both violated charters and broken compacts ; 
we have, above all, furnished, in the person and by the ef- 
forts of Roger Williams, the self-denying but resolute seceder, 
on the margin of an humble river, now adorned with manu- 
factories, churches, and colleges, the splendid triumph ot 
the great doctrine which, soon spreading to Maryland and 
Pennsylvania, now pervades the whole Union, of entire 
liberty of conscience, and total freedom in religious matters 
from the dictation of civil power. 



These are the obelisks and pyramids we have raised — the 
triumphal arches, built for posterity to admire ! These have 
been a few of the consequences of our principles. It is 
by these, and efforts such as these, that our march is still 
forward in a career of prosperity as unexampled as it is 
glorious. When our opinions are misrepresented — ^our in- 
stitutions vilified — our ancestors and rulers assailed — we can 
proudly point to our history and say, " By their fruits ye 
shall know them." 

Though in many respects we have ceased to be the infant 
Hercules, yet in others we are still, as Burke once beautifully 
said of us, quite in the gristle of youth, and it is hoped, aspire 
not to reach the hardiness of manhood in all things, till every 
useful application of science to art, every practical progress in 
the great business of life as well as in government has been 
attempted, and the whole moral grandeur of our national posi- 
tion and principles developed. 

In such an indefatigable career in the pursuit of general 
usefulness to all, and by all, it is true, and far from derogatory, 
that we may not yet have collected the libraries of Gottingen 
or Oxford, because our true policy has been rather in the first 
instance to collect and educate a population suited to subdue 
the wilderness, establish manufactures, and extend commerce. 

Nor may we have exhibited critics in the classics like Scali- 
ger, Bently, or Johnson, because our earlier wants have been 
for critics in the forms of government, like Madison, and crit- 
ics in the forms of law or administration of justice, like Wil- 
son or Kent. We may not have educated mathematicians 
like Euler and La Place, or philosophers like Boyle, because 
our similar geniuses, such as Bowditch, have been more en- 
gaged in translating and applying the reasonings of others to 
navigation and practical life, and, as Franklin, Fulton, God- 
frey, and a host of inventors and benefactors, in rendering 
useful to their country the doctrines, sciences, and discoveries 
of former ages as well as their own. Nor have we produced 



Byrons, Raphaels, and Canovas, nor courted the muses and 
the graces with as distinguished success in those thousand 
other attractive forms so common in older countries, because 
our ambition has rather been directed to what naturjilly pre- 
cedes those in society, to the performance of deeds worthy 
the immortality conferred by the poet, the painter, and the 
sculptor. 

It is mortifying to see our position in these respects so often, 
so greatly, and so obstinately misunderstood. The pert sar- 
casms of many might have been spared, had they reflected 
that the judicious here never presented claims for any peculiar 
distinction, however brilliant, occasionally, has been the suc- 
cess of many among us in belles-lettres, and all those pursuits 
which are the usual result of only great wealth and the am- 
plest leisure. On the contrary, we have, with much superior 
wisdom, considering our true position, and probably with not 
less real talent, and certainly with equal industry, been prin- 
cipally devoted to the business much more natural, appro- 
priate, and important, in our youthful stage of society and 
with our vast physical resources, to the useful business of con- 
verting forests into fruitful fields, bridging rivers, spanning 
mountains with roads, uniting seas by canals, and making 
every hill and valley vocal with beings, industrious, moral, 
intelligent, and happy, by training, as far and fast as practica- 
ble, the whole population, whether wealthy or indigent, native 
or alien, to self-government, and the enjoyment as well as 
preservation of equal rights and well-regulated liberty. 

What do your annals show has been the result of all this ? 
Not the highest perfection in what the community generally, 
or the Government, never sought — in poetry, painting, stat- 
uary, monumental piles, or splended architecture — but great 
success in the wise objects of their true ambition — in the 
enlightenment and comforts of the population at large, for 
whom and by whom the country has been conquered, planted, 
civilized, and ruled. By that policy and success we have, 



39 

instead of remaining a people among whom to read was so 
rare when America was discovered as to confer an exemp- 
tion from punishment by the benefit of clergy, become a 
universally reading people. Without the help of kings, peers, 
or prelates, as legislators, we have also become a writing and 
" calculating" people, more versed in the best elements of 
education than many of their titled ancestors ; and among 
whom their language is, by the wide action of the press on 
the people and the people on the press, spoken with more 
purity and uniformity than the language of any country of 
similar size in Europe. A people better clothed than half 
the subjects of the proudest Edwards ; a people better housed 
than those of the Henries; better furnished and fed than 
Elizabeth's, and better protected in every valuable right than 
those of all the Williams and Louises of any age and nation. 
A people, in fine, who, rather than their rulers, are sovereign 
in all things, and being an educated and moral people, can be, 
and are, behind and over all their governments, safely em- 
powered, as sovereign, to change or destroy at pleasure every 
institution and law, and reconstruct them in the peaceful 
mode established by their constitutions. 

This consideration leads me to a brief notice of a few 
other circumstances which have transpired here in connex- 
ion with our new constitutions and new systems of juris- 
prudence, which are among the most interesting to the 
human race of any that resulted from the discovery of 
America. As before suggested, while presenting here-, 
during a century and a half, a theatre on which the op- 
pressed and enterprising might exhibit more freely their 
various principles, aspirations, and experiments, for the im- 
provement of man, the training for self-government on those 
principles, and in forms most acceptable to the majority of the 
governed, seemed at length to be nearly completed, when the 
Revolution rendered us independent, and prostrated every 
barrier which had before existed against putting all those 
principles into more efficient practice. The fruit of liberty 



u 



40 

had become nearly ripe for plucking, and hence was not des- 
tined to be in its taste, as in France, Spain, Italy, and else- 
where, so often like the apples of Sodom. Our fathers had 
read, reflected, and reasoned deeply, and knew society must 
be held together by some strong cement, or the inherent love 
for the state of nature and individual independence which 
actuates most human beings, would lead to separation or dis- 
solution, if not to mutual aggression. That cement is usually 
a clear conviction of benefits to be derived from society, or is 
mere arbitrary power, accompanied sometimes by fraud and 
delusion. We had rid ourselves from the domination of any 
portion of such power in our former oppressors, and were to 
commence the task of moulding institutions which might in 
some way secure to us more perfect freedom, and at the 
same time be adapted to confer equal if not greater pro- 
tection and prosperity. But a continuance of monarchy was 
so abhorred in any shape that it seems scarcely to have 
been dreamed of. Yet, in rejecting that or any other arbi- 
trary power, as a cement or preservative, whether foreign 
or domestic in its origin, and however derived, it became 
obvious to the reflecting that an extraordinary substitute 
must be found in some other elements of political cohe- 
sion,^ 5r~goveriiment would dissolve into chaos. Hence the 
prophets of royal prerogative were full of mischievous pre- 
dictions as to the incapacity of our people to govern them- 
selves, and as to an early catastrophe of the whole system. 
Even the friends of equal rights began to feel some slight 
apprehensions at the prospect. But having ascertained, du- 
ring the old confederation, that there must be a given or 
sufiicient quantity of power in order to make a nation, like 
a planet, revolve steadily in its proper orbit ; and hence, 
if one kind of it, that from an arbitrary origin, was dimin- 
ished, the other kind, that from a voluntary origin, and 
resting in the general information and sound moral prin- 
■ciples of the community, with laws and government more 



41 

beneficial and equal, established by them, must be proper- 
tionably strengthened or increased — the founders of our pres- 
ent constitutions set about their new duties with earnestness 
and vigor. Seeing that their confederation, if not in some 
material respects recast or remoulded, must utterly perish, the 
wise, the good, and the talented throughout the land, all with 
a chivalrous spirit, co-operated in rousing the intelligence and 
virtue of the people to increased efforts in establishing insti- 
tutions productive of the greatest benefits, not only to the 
separate States but to the Union. They thus guarded us 
against " the dark and dishonest intrigues" of kings abroad 
or demagogues at home, and prevented us from falling again 
into colonial dependance, or into those divisions, anarchy, and 
licentiousness, which are the bane of all national improve- 
ment. They co-operated, also, in creating those securities 
or property and person as well as for State rights — in fulfilling 
those obligations of public indebtedness, and in yielding that 
equal protection to all branches of industry which good faith 
and national prosperity required ; and in rallying, on every 
fit occasion, to the aid of order, law, and liberty, all the in- 
tellectual and moral energies of the whole population. 

The true philosophy which, therefore, was made to per- 
vade our new constitutional and legislative systems, was the 
offspring of this discovery of a necessity to make those sys- 
tems a source of increased advantages to all affected by them, 
and to strengthen or secure government by greater atten- 
tion to education and morals, and by making more frequent 
invocations to their aid in the absence of arbitrary power 
and severer laws. Hence they began by offering benefits 
alone, and by removing all restraints from expatriation by 
those who at any time might become discontented with their 
portion derived from the common fund of advantages, polit- 
ical and social, or be dissatisfied with the umpirage of that 
majority in the Government which, though so often pro- 



42 

nounced a tyrant, must lay the basis of all free society. 
They next were careful to leave neither individual nor 
State without a due share of rights, not only in the Gov- 
ernment itself, but under it ; to recognise politically no 
distinction of plebeian or patrician, and generally none of 
Catholic, Jew, or Protestant ; to control neither the person 
nor property, where the individual had been educated to the 
self-management of them, except so far as was indispensa- 
ble for mere public objects ; to disclaim all power not vol- 
untarily conferred ; to make all government be regarded as 
a blessing, when and so far as it was resorted to, rather than 
an unnecessary restraint, and to impart civil power to and 
over none in any case, further than was necessary to enforce 
justly the laws of the majority. As a general rule, nothing 
but gross ignorance or vice were ever permanently put to 
the ban of exclusion from a proportionate participation in 
public affairs. 

In order to ensure more certainly the faithful discharge 
of official duty, by all to whom power was with jealousy 
and caution confided, one great characteristic of their politi- 
cal system has been its more complete separation of the le- 
gislative, executive, and judicial departments of the Govern- 
ment from mixture, and thus rendering the discharge of 
duties under each of them more simple and easy. They 
also established much more rigid checks and balances in 
legislation itself, and official accountability has been greatly 
and almost constantly on the increase, by shortening the 
term of office, as well as surrounding it with other new 
guards and responsibilities. This frequent and full reckoning 
between the electors and the elected, exacts a more rigor- 
ous responsibility than generally has characterized any other 
government, however popular and free ; and, while it may 
be open to the imputation of some encroachment upon indi- 
vidual and official independence, it secures, what in our sys- 
tem is generally deemed more essential, a conformity in 



43 

official action with the known will and wishes of those who 
made and conferred the office, and who are chiefly to bene- 
fit or suffer by all the measures of men in office. It consti- 
tutes, also, a more effectual preventive to the usurpations 
of power — power, which, in its general tendencies, is often 
insidious, voracious, and selfish ; which is apt to increase its 
appetite by indulgence, and which, unless vigilantly watched 
and frequently summoned to account, is prone to steal from 
the many to the few, till every vestige of real liberty is lost. 
The amplest authority was conferred to constitute a govern- 
ment both salutary and efficient for all useful purposes, but 
not a pittance for pageantry or oppression. / The strongest ' 
securities were at the same time interposed to prevent abuses 
by officers to whom such liberal powers were intrusted, for 
the benefit of others more than of themselves. 

It will be perceived, from only these general suggestions, 
how different has been the character of our efforts here for 
self-government, from what they have often been elsewhere, 
whether in ancient or modern history ; and how strikingly 
most of the causes of their difference can be traced to that 
practical education and sound morals which have so thor- 
oughly pervaded this country, and which may well be 
deemed the strongest citadel of our constitutions. On our 
northern border, some sixty years since, the colony whose 
co-operation was anticipated in the great struggle for inde- 
pendence, was visited by a mission from the old Congress, 
of whom Dr. Franklin was one, and well provided with 
pamphlets and manifestoes. The inhabitants, however, were 
found so generally ignorant as to be unable to read them ; 
and their condition in this respect appeared so hopeless, 
that, on his return, he recommended that the next embassy 
should consist of school-masters. What a signal illustration 
of his sagacity, and of the importance of education, is their 
history since ! — showing that, after half a century more, they 
still remain in the same provincial subjection to a distant 



44 

empire, and in almost the same torpid condition, as to the 
great principles of liberty. 

Montesquieu and some others have mentioned virtue alone 
as the preserving element in popular governments. But this 
is an error, if virtue can be separated from intelligence, almost 
as fatal as that of supposing education alone to be sufficient. 
Our whole history shows that both have been intimately 
combined whenever we have prospered highly, and one or 
the other has always been defective, both in America and 
elsewhere, whenever a signal failure in self-government has 
occurred. 

It shows, also, that the two, united, become,' in a democ- 
racy, the predominant if not only legitimate substitutes for 
arbitrary power. That they are our great Mentors — one to 
instruct us in our duties as well as rights, and the other to 
impel us onward to the performance of them ; one to en- 
lighten, the other to convince ; one to prepare us for right 
action, the other to make us act, or to give us proper motives 
for exertion. The conviction of these momentous truths was 
therefore so deep, it led our ancestors to commence the in- 
dulgence of equal rights, in no case, till knowledge existed 
and correct principles had been thoroughly inculcated in 
respect to the use and character of those rights ; instead of 
commencing, as in many other regions, the rude levelling of all 
distinctions of political rank and civil privilege, before many 
of those about to participate in them were acquainted with 
their true limitations or design, and before they were grad- 
ually trained, like those ancestors and ourselves, almost 
from the cradle, in their correct exercise and necessary disci- 
pline. Without this training, or the education and morals 
indispensible to perfect it, a grant of equal political power 
and consequently of almost unrestrained liberty, would be 
not only a harbinger but an invitation to unbridled license — 
to plunder, conflagration, and indiscriminate butchery. Such 
a course stands, therefore, condemned by reason, condemned 



45 

by experience, condemned by all history. It would evince a 
hatred rather than love of our species, and prove a curse to 
all within its sanguinary and fanatical influence. Notwith- 
standing, therefore, some arrogant taunts on this subject from 
abroad, it would be usurpation and tyranny for any of the 
Governments under our restricted systems to attempt to 
adopt such a course towards any class of unfortunate beings, 
over whom no such authority has ever been confided to them 
by the people or the States, and probably from a just jealousy 
never will be confided. At the same time it would as clear- 
ly be the height of folly if not insanity for any Governments 
which may ever possess such authority, to offer at once per- 
fect equality to candidates so uneducated, undisciplined, and 
in almost every respect grossly unqualified. 

But when, how, and where the process ought to begin, are 
questions that have been perplexing in all countries as well 
as here — that belong exclusively to such Governments alone 
as possess the power, and for their decision on which they 
are politically amenable to no other human tribunal, but only 
subject to that moral judgment of civilized mankind, and the 
great Governor of the universe, to which all intelligent be- 
ings are equally subject, for the correct discharge of every 
duty. 

The practical education and views of our fathers in all 
things, led them, also, to devise new provisions, new guards, 
and new inducements for the preservation of the rights they 
established. Their history shows that, unlike many other 
reformers, they did not deem it sufficient to proclaim equality 
merely on parchment, or only in some organic law or char- 
ter, like a constitution — but they carried, gradually though 
firmly, in substance though not in exact form or with ab- 
stract and mathematical precision, the general principle of 
equality into common legislation and the usages of the social 
system, so as to secure what they had sought diligently and to 
prevent the stone they had with great toil rolled to the sum- 



46 

mit from rushing back, as too often has been the case, and 
crushing, in an unguarded moment, the political labors of years. 
To notice a few more of the particular consequences from 
this policy, it may be added that the tenure and distribution 
of property p/ intestates were in time rendered equal ; and 
this alone struck deep and wide the roots of great uniformity 
of condition into our whole social system. The feudalties, 
unequal inheritances, and mortmains of monarchy in respect 
to landed property, were also slowly abolished, breaking up 
with them most of the overgrown proprietary estates, and 
large possessions of every kind, and introducing almost uni- 
versal freeholds and fee simples, so that every citizen could 
feel and be in some degree lord of the soil. The creation 
of exclusive privileges and monopolies of all kinds was dis- 
countenanced in theory, though not always sufficiently in 
practice. But, in progress of time, the useful substitute has 
begun to spread, which is more congenial to the intelligence 
of the present age and to the preservation of equality of 
rights, to permit and protect joint associations for useful ob- 
jects and under salutary restrictions, but seldom to make 
them exclusive. The elective franchise was also by degrees 
conferred on man himself, rather than the soil or estate he 
owned. Property as well as person was protected, but not 
made a new power or independent dominion in the State. 
The aristocracy of mere money, as well as the aristocracy of 
birth, was in time equally renounced in theory^ and the prog- 
ress of these improvements in changing many antiquated 
notions and abolishing certain remains of monarchical privi- 
leges or analogies, like the growth of the human frame, was 
wisely gradual, and in accordance with the acquisition of 
new authority, and the greater experience and intelligence 
of the community, and not so quick as to blind with sudden 
or excessive light, or to bewilder the weak, or to break down 
the unpractised with the excessive weight of unusual power 
and responsibility. The administration of laws and the en- 



47 

joyment ol equal freedom were not at once rashly conferred 
on infants in years or acquirements, on the incapable, the 
convict and the slave ; but the dispensation of justice was al- 
lowed to be aided by all who were qualified to be jurors ; 
legislation intrusted to and perfected by all who were edu- 
cated and represented in it ; arms allowed to be in the hands 
of all who had any thing to defend, and all the laws, like the 
shell of the marine animal, formed not to suit others, or by 
others, such as the inheritable Lycurguses or Solons of a 
monarchy, but to suit as well those who needed the laws 
as those the laws were destined to protect. Pursuing 
the analogy, they were thus afterwards changed with ease, 
as the growth and necessities of the community demanded. 
Thus have we wisely, but therefore slowly and in clear 
cases, moulded most of our legislation to suit the rights of our 
people, and the nature of their social condition. 

Led by the sympathies in favor of our species, usually at- 
tendant on intelligence and virtue widely diffused, the public 
have sought reform and improvement with such commenda- 
ble zeal and generosity, that even the lowest have not been 
overlooked. The real pauper, from infirmity of body or 
mind, has been not only maintained by law, but, when ca- 
pable, has been furnished with useful instruction, to enlarge 
his faculties and elevate his soul. Imprisonment for debt has 
also been generally abolished ; humane and relief societies 
multiplied ; asylums and hospitals for the insane, as well as 
sick, liberally established ; and an eagerness evinced, by 
means of similar institutions, to pour intelligence, if not 
sound, even into the deaf; letters, if not light, into the blind; 
and language, if not speech, into the dumb. The penal code 
has been stripped of most of its Draco principles — abandon- 
ing sanguinary floggings, pillories, and tortures, as well as 
barbarous executions, it has become almost universally one 
of comparative mildness as well as of reformation. Beyond 
the spirit of the age elsewhere, and far outstripping its prog- 



48 

ress in these respects in all other countries, the greatest 
efforts have been made to prevent, rather than severely to 
punish, the largest class of crimes, and to rely more on the 
schoolmaster, the spelling-book, and the bible, for safety or 
improvement, than on the stocks, or the whipping-post, or 
the prison. 

When man has thus been carefully educated to his political 
position, and all around him is in just keeping with it, the bar- 
riers of advancement are soon prostrated, and he becomes, in 
fact and in theory, the only monarch of the soil — the only au- 
thor of his own laws — the sole arbiter, in most respects, of 
his own destiny. Then it is, that he possesses every motive, 
human and divine, to act, not with rashness, precipitancy, 
folly, or wickedness. The ballot-box is then the sovereign 
remedy for most political evils, instead of mobs, or riots, or 
revolution. The conflicts of opinion and interest are there, 
for a time, adjusted ; injustice, extravagances, and excesses, 
defeated or chastened ; and the differences of tastes or de- 
sires — the inevitable strifes of liberty and independence — are, 
for an allotted season, either softened or compromised, so far 
as regards their political operation, by the conclusive, though 
often mixed decision of the majority. Defeat, as well as oc- 
casional victory, come so often and unexpectedly, that the 
whole habit of the country is to bear both with moderation, if 
not philosophic resignation, and to rely on another trial at the 
polls, in due time, for the correction of any former errors, ra- 
ther than on a resort to force. If the decisions there in re- 
gard to men and measures, produced by intrigue or temporary 
excitement, look sometimes like caprice, and prove to be real 
injuries to the voters themselves, as well as to others, they 
are usually soon reversed, on fuller information. For, as 
Lord Mansfield, (no strong friend of popular rights,) once 
conceded, " the people are almost always in the right. The 
great may sometimes be in the wrong, but the great body of 
the people are always in the right." Revolution or rebellion, 



49 

which, in extreme cases, ever will and must be exercised by 
those suffering under flagrant oppression, hopeless and irrem- 
ediable in any other mode, is the extreme medicine, to be ap- 
plied only in those extreme cases, and is not to become with 
impunity daily food. Indeed, when the supposed sufferer 
helps both to make and administer the laws, and if dissatisfied 
with the decisions of the majority, can generally withdraw, 
if, after repeated peaceable trials, unable to change them, 
there is little apology for an appeal to any demoralizing and 
disorganizing measures. Having a country and a government 
of his own to be saved, he is generally ready to sink or swim 
with their political destinies. But, if irregularities occur, un- 
der the deep impulses of an over-sensitive love of liberty, or 
a sudden delusion as to facts and principles, the true policy of 
our system is, and always has been, to indulge in leniency, if 
not forgiveness, and to seek future reformation by additional 
teaching in both letters and morals, rather than by inexorable 
severity. A reasoning, enlightened, and moral population, are 
to be managed rather by reason than force, and, under all dis- 
appointments and disasters, possess an inherent recuperative 
energy that prevents either despair or ruin. In such a popu- 
lation there is a vis medicatrix which will sustain the state 
against very violent shocks, and restore its institutions to a 
condition of safety or stability, after subtle encroachments or 
great indiscretion in departures from sound principles. Con- 
stitutions as well as laws, after deliberately established, are 
not thus in practice fickle as the breeze. But the disposition 
is wisely cherished, and very prevalent in our annals, to alter 
only what is manifestly wrong, and with great pertinadty to 
abide by whatever is found, after due experiment, not in 
a great degree prejudicial to the common weal or to individ- 
ual liberty and enterprise. While properly making all things 
in theoiy liable to change, as greater experience and inlorma- 
tion might require, our ancestors, since the Revolution, have 
5 



50 

dealt with caution and delicacy in legislation for the transac- 
tions of real life, and seldom entered into too minute and 
vexatious details, or countenanced very sudden innovations. 
They well knew that " the world had been governed too 
much," and that it was more secure and often more advanta- 
geous to stand by tried laws and institutions, though in some 
respects defective, than to embark constantly on doubtful 
schemes of supposed improvement in any thing and every 
thing which restlessness, rashness or ambition, passion or 
ignorance, might feel disposed to hazard. Hence, they bore 
various oppressions and much rank injustice, long as they 
were bearable and any hope was left of peaceable redress, 
previous to their resort to forcible resistance ; and hence, the 
strongest reliance can always be since placed on the perma- 
nency of our institutions and laws, so long as they confer in any 
reasonable degree the benefits anticipated from them. Their 
maxims and practice have always been to advance, but to ad- 
vance cautiously, /esiina lente. It is true our people have gen- 
erally sought liberty in all things, so far as consistent with the 
preservation of the social system in safe operation ; and that 
they have trusted for protection much more to the better re- 
straints of good education and sound morals, than to frequent 
changes or great severity in their laws. It is also true that, in 
doubtful exigencies, their general bearing has always been in 
favor of increasing liberty ; but still it has not been liberty in- 
dependent of law, or opposed to it, but liberty in conformity 
to law. They have sought the law of liberty, rather than the 
liberty to dispense with the law. 

The freedom of the press, for instance, however perverted 
at times, or occasionally lowered in its legitimate influence 
by groundless and indiscriminate animadversions, was, at an 
early day, fully established here, unchecked except by being 
made legally subject to punishment for flagrant wrongs. 

From Milton's " speech for the liberty of unlicensed print- 
ing," published about the time many of our fathers emigrated 



51 

hither, to the expiration of the celebrated sedition law, as well 
as since, the idea has " grown with our growth," that a still 
more effective remedy to prevent the licentiousness of the 
press, or the tongue through the press, is rather to be found in 
public intelligence and sound morals, than in the prison, or 
the pillory, or in personal violence inflicted thoughtlessly on 
its indiscreet conductors. However, then, we may lament its 
occasional prostitution, mingled, it is admitted, with many ex- 
cellencies, and however we may regret the manifold abuses 
of free discussion and liberty of speech as well as of the press, 
yet they all rest on imperishable principles. Experience 
shows that real merit lives down most calumnies, and that time 
so far destroys or corrects the evils, whether of the press or 
the tongue, that of all the dunces who assailed the Popes, 
Chathams, or Burkes, of former days, their slanders and them- 
selves have mostly sunk into one common oblivion, except as 
preserved by the unnecessary notice of those they vilified. 

True liberty here in any thing, never can be the mere 
Gothic license of irregularity or violence. The numerous 
examples of history, as well as ordinary intelligence and plain 
common sense, teach us that such a liberty is more full of dis- 
asters, more ruinous to the cause of uniformity in rights, se- 
curity of person or property, orderly happiness, and prosper- 
ous greatness, than a tyranny the most miserable, partial, and ^ 
bloody. Such a liberty lays the axe at the root of society 
itself, and renders every thing a prey to the inequality and 
injustice of mere brute force, ignorant passion, or unbridled 
wickedness. If any thing called law then remains, " lust will 
become a law, and envy will become a law, and covetousness 
and ambition will become laws." But the liberty sanctioned 
by our fathers, and pervading all our institutions, is the liberty 
created and sustained not only by law, but that kind of law 
which, with calmness and sound deliberation, is previously 
promulgated, by an enlightened public will, to be the true rule 
of right ; and of the pure spirit of which, in the eloquent de- 



52 

scription of Hooker, " no less can be acknowledged than that 
her seat is the bosom of God, her voice the harmony of the 
world." It is the liberty not to trample on the rights of the 
weak and the poor, any more than to assail and undermine 
those of the strong or the rich ; but the liberty, even fastidious 
or scrupulous, to enjoy those rights, as fully by the one class 
as the other, both under the shield of legal protection, but 
neither under monopolies, and both equally invulnerable un- 
der the broad panoply of sacred constitutions, wholesome 
statutes, and upright as well as intelligent judicial tribunals. 
Nor is liberty considered here, as it often is abroad, to consist 
properly in opposition to the existing government — a govern- 
ment in most countries imposed on the people at large no less 
than on the wretched, by conquest, doubtful inheritance, or 
force and usurpation — but it is evinced rather by a support of 
the useful operations of that government here, which all have 
virtually united in devising and profiting by. As little is liberty 
displayed here by a bitter dislike to the laws, on the ground 
that "the world is not one's friend, nor the world's law," 
because the law here is usually the friend, the child, the ally of 
all, as all who are qualified, help to make the law, all repose 
under its shelter, and most people duly appreciate the benefit 
of enforcing it. Hence, as a general truth, every eye here is 
vigilant, and every hand armed to detect and punish ordinary 
offences, as well as to expose official misdemeanors ; and the 
pride, ambition, interest, and duty of the whole community, 
are arrayed on the side of order, and in support of their own 
constitutions and laws. Nor ought they ever to grant the 
liberty to oppress any one class, party, or sect, but the liberty 
to all of them, of enjoying freedom of speech and discussion 
within the limits before mentioned, and of obtaining immu- 
nity from oppression, and redress for injury, through the estab- 
lished legal channels. Not, in their private capacity, to be 
their own avengers, and redress wrongs, cither of person or 
property, punish crimes, make and unmake laws, constitu- 



53 

tions, or appointments to office ; but to do them all in the 
respective methods, regular, public, and constitutional, which 
equality, justice, sound knowledge, sound morals, and all 
the lessons and admonitions of history point out as salutary 
and safe : that is, through the jury ; on the magistrate's 
bench ; in authorized conventions ; legislative assemblies ; at 
the ballot-box, or the polls, and in proper executive sta- 
tions. '^ Liberty thus regulated and enforced, becomes the 
champion rather than antagonist of law, and the strongest 
bulwark of social order. Fortunate people ! Happy country, 
if all the teachings of its history, in these respects, are not 
lost upon us and our posterity H while the blind instincts of 
an uneducated or a vicious population often hurry them into 
sedition, refractory insubordination, and every species of law- 
less violence, the informed mind, and strong moral sense of 
the great mass among us, make them conscious that, however 
sophistry may elsewhere disguise the great truth, or false 
systems of policy may delude or degrade the lower classes, and 
then subject them to endure, tamely, humiliation from their 
fellow-mortals, or inflame them into madness and forcible 
vengeance against oppression, the just rule of conduct is 
always the same in public as in private aff"airs, and that in the 
end it is as ruinous to one as the other to have the right 
known and yet the wrong pursued. They are aware that if 
the population are habituated to think and act, even in politics 
alone, as mere Cossacks, serving, whether individuals, cor- 
porations, or parties, solely because the pay is highest, and 
the labor and danger are supposed to be least ; and if such 
mercenaries ever inquire into what is right, and knowledge in 
them, as in other cases, becomes power, still, without sound 
morals as its director and restraint, it becomes but the power 
of the blinded Cyclops in his cave, useless to himself and 
harmless to his enemies. Or, if like Sampson's, destructive to 
his enemies, it is at the same time equally destructive to its 



54 

possessor, crushing himself, ere long, with them, under the 
ruins of the overturned pillars of the social edifice. 

We have not leisure to travel through the more modern 
revolutions, in the American annals, and to gather the nu- 
merous illustrations on this subject, written on the fair fields 
of South America, or Mexico, in blood and tears. Indeed, 
the first discoverers of the new world seem to have been, 
in many respects, the very least of its regenerators ; and 
it is most lamentable in^ their history, that they have receiv- 
ed almost as little benefits in return, at home, as they were 
unfortunate in conferring abroad. 

In conclusion, therefore, while meditating upon our own 
astonishing progress, as developed in history, and discrimi- 
nating with care the origin alike of our perils and securities 
^s as a people, does it not behoove us to weigh well the im- 
\J portance of our present position ? Not our position merely 
with regard to foreign Powers. From them we have, by an 
early start and rapid progress in the cause of equal rights, 
long ceased to fear much injury or to hope for very essential 
aid, in our further efforts for the thorough improvement of 
the condition of society in all that is useful or commendable. 
Nor our position, however the true causes may be distorted 
or denied — our elevated position, in prosperity and honora- 
ble estimation, both at home and abroad. But it is our posi- 
tion, so highly responsible, as the only country where the 
growth of self-government seems fully to have ripened and 
to have become a model or example to other nations ; or, 
as the case may prove, their scoft' and scorn. 

To falter here, and now, would, therefore, probably be to 
cause the experiment of such a government to fail forever. 
It is not sufficient, in this position, to loathe servitude, or to 
love liberty with all the enthusiasm of Plutarch's heroes. 
But we must be warned by our history how to maintain 
liberty — how to grasp the substance rather than the shadow — 
to disregard rhetorical flourishes, unless accompanied by 



65 

deeds — not to be cajoled by holiday finery, or pledges enough 
to carpet the polls, where integrity and burning zeal do not 
exist to redeem them — nor to permit ill-vaulting ambition 
to volunteer and vaunt its professions of ability as well as 
willingness to serve the people against their own govern- 
ment — any more than demagogues, in a rougher mood, with 
a view to rob you, sacrilegiously, of those principles, or un- 
dermine, with insidious pretensions, those equal institutions 
which your fathers bled to secure. Nor does true reform, 
however frequent in this position, and under those institu- 
tions, scarely ever consist in violence, or what usually amounts 
to revolution, the sacred right of which, by force or rebellion, 
in extreme cases of oppression, being seldom necessary to be 
exercised here, because reform is one of the original ele- 
ments of those institutions, and one of their great, peaceable, 
and prescribed objects. However the timid, then, may fear, 
or the wealthy denounce its progress, it is the principal safety- 
valve of our system, rather than an explosion to endanger or 
destroy it. We should also weigh well our delicate position as 
the sole country whither the discontented in all others resort 
freely, and, while conforming to the laws, abide securely ; and 
whither the tide of emigration, whether for good or evil, 
seems each year setting with increased force. 

When we reflect on these circumstances, with several 
others, which leisure does not permit me to enumerate ; and 
when we advert to some of the occurrences in our social and 
political condition, within the few last years, appearing worse, 
it is feared, than the slight irregularities and outbreaks of 
great freedom, on such periodical excitements as elections ; 
and looking rather, in some cases, like more grave departures 
from legal subordination, and attended, as they have been, 
on different occasions, and in different quarters, by no feeble 
indications of obliquity of principle, in morals as well as 
politics, evinced by violent aggressions, not only on person 
and property, but the rights of conscience and of free dis- 



♦ 56 

cussion — while we see all this, what does our delicate and 
peculiar position teach, as to the perils of American liberty ? 
What warning spirit breathes from those events ? What in- 
ferences should philosophy and our sober judgments draw 
from their history ? 

Is it not manifest that the danger now to be guarded against 
is one arising rather from too little than too much control on 
the part of the Government ; too little rather than too much, 
reverence for the constitution, the supremacy of the laws, and 
the sacredness of personal rights as well as those of property ; 
and if not an undue homage to mere wealth, still too great 
presumptuousness from the enjoyment of such unexampled 
prosperity ? Looking higher and deeper, is there not seen, also, 
too much indifference beginning to be entertained in some quar- 
ters, with regard to the perpetuity of the Union ? — that political 
marriage of the States, upon which, like that of our first pa- 
rents, " all heaven and happy constellations shed their se- 
lectest intiuence." Does there not exist too great an apathy 
respecting our imperative and lofty duty not to disappoint, 
in any way, the aspirations and the confidence of the patriot 
or the philanthropist, in every country directed towards us for 
the conservation of all the best hopes of the human race ? 
Suspecting, then, some such evil tendencies — feeling such 
doubts, and fearing such dangers, what do our annals point 
out as the true republican remedy to check them ? Not, 
we trust, a revival — in substance any more than in form — 
of the stronger arm of monarchical power which preceded 
the Revolution. By no means. Not, in any crisis, rushing 
for preservation from outrage or for rescue from anarchy 
and licentiousness to stronger systems of government — to 
what, it is hoped, we all deprecate and dread in unnecessary 
restraints on individual liberty and more arbitrary establish- 
ments, under the pretence of aids, though in reality often the 
most dangerous weapons wielded by the arm of civil power. 
Never, never. Nor yet a change in our codes of law. 



57 

harshly increasing their severity, conferring unequal privileges 
or perpetuating exclusive powers, at the expense of the birth- 
right and liberties of others. Nor an elevation of property 
and its possessors to greater dominion over the rights of per- 
sons, when its strides have already been so coUossal, and its 
influence so overwhelming. 

Neither ought we to indulge in despondency, however 
apprehensive, with the great blind bard of modern times, that, 
in some, respects, we " have fallen on evil days and evil 
tongues ;" and however conscious that, as a people, we are 
not entirely free from foibles, errors, and crime, in^ this 
erring world, and have not been able to reach every excel- 
lence as a nation, or to mature every political security of 
which our constitutions are susceptible, in the brief period of 
about half a century. 

On the contrary, it behooves us to look our perils and diffi- 
culties, such as ihef are, in the face. Then, with the exer- 
cise of candor., calmness, and fortitude, being able to compre- 
hend fully their character and extent, let us profit by the 
teachings of almost every page in our annals, that any defects 
under our existing system have resulted more from the manner 
of administering it than from its substance or form. We less 
need new laws, new institutions, or new powers, than we 
need, on all occasions, at all times, and in all places, the y" 
requisite intelligence concerning the true spirit of our present 
ones ; the high moral courage under every hazard, and against 
every offender, to execute with fidelity the authority already 
possessed ; and the manly independence to abandon all supine- 
ness, irresolution, vacillation, and time-serving pusillanim- 
ity, and enforce our present mild system with that uniformity 
and steady vigor throughout, which alone can supply the place 
of the greater severity of less free institutions. To arm and 
encourage us in renewed efforts to accomplish every thing on 
this subject which is desirable, our history constantly points 



58 

her finger to a most efficient resource and indeed to the only 
elixir, to secure a long life to any popular government, in 
increased attention to useful education and sound morals, with 
the wise description of equal measures and just practices they 
inculcate on every leaf of recorded time. Before their alliance 
the spirit of misrule will always in time stand rebuked, and 
those who worship at the shrine of unhallowed ambition must 
quail. Storms in the political ati^sphere may occasionally 
happen by the encroachments of usurpers, the corruption or 
intrigues of demagogues, or in the expiring agonies of faction, 
or by the sudden fury of popular phrensy ; but with the re- 
straints and salutary influences of the allies before described, 
these storms will purify as healthfully as they often do in the 
physical world, and cause the tree of liberty, instead of falling, 
to strike its roots deeper. In this struggle the enlightened and 
moral possess also a power, auxiliary and strong, in the spirit 
of the age, which is not only with them, but onward, in every 
thing to ameliorate or improve. When the struggle assumes 
the form of a contest with power in all its subtlety, or with un- 
dermining and corrupting wealth, as it sometimes may, rather 
than with turbulence, sedition, or open aggression, by the 
needy and desperate, it will be indispensable to employ still 
greater vigilance — to cherish earnestness of purpose, resolute- 
ness in conduct — to apply hard and constant blows to real abuses 
rather milk-and-water remedies, and encourage not only bold, 
free, and original thinking, but determined action. In such a 
cause our fathers were men whose hearts were not accus- 
tomed to fail them through fear, however formidable the ob- 
stacles. Some of them were companions of Cromwell, and 
embued deeply with his spirit and iron-decision of character, 
in whatever they deemed right : " If Pope, and Spaniard, 
and devil, (said he,) all set themselves against us, though they 
should compass us about as bees, as it is in the 18th Psalm, 
yet in the name of the Lord we will destroy them." We are 
not, it is trusted, such degenerate descendants as to prove 



59 

recreant, and fail to defend, with gallantry and firmness as 
unflinching, all which we have either derived from them, or 
since added to the rich inheritance. 

New means and energies can yearly be brought to bear 
on the further enlightening of the public mind. Self-inter- 
est, respectability in society, official rank, wealth, superior 
enjoyment, are all held out as the rewards of increased in- 
telligence and good conduct. The untaught in letters, as 
well as the poor in estate, cannot long close their eyes or their 
judgments to those great truths of daily occurrence in our his- 
tory. They cannot but feel that the laws, when duly execu- 
ted, ensure these desirable ends in a manner even more strik- 
ing to themselves and children, drudges and serfs as they may 
once have been, than to the learned, wealthy, or great. They 
see the humblest log-cabin rendered as secure a castle as the 
palace, and the laborer in the lowest walks of life as quickly 
entitled to the benefit of a habeas corpus when imprisoned 
without warrant of law, as the highest in power, and assured 
of as full and ready redress for personal violence, and of in- 
demnity as ample for injury to character or damage to prop- 
erty. Not a particle of his estate, though but a single ewe- 
lamb in the Western wilderness, or the most sterile acre on 
the White mountains, can be taken away with impunity, 
though by the most powerful, without the voluntary consent 
of the indigent owner, nor even be set apart for public pur- 
poses, without the same necessities and the same just com- 
pensation awarded as in case of the greatest. 

To any man thus situated, any thing agrarian about proper- 
ty would be as ruinous, looking to the prosperity of himself 
and to his family in future, as it would be to the wealthy now. 
Political and civil rights being made equal, it becomes much 
better, no less for the poor but well-informed and enterpri- 
sing, than for the cause of society and virtue at large, as well 
as the present safety of the rich, that the future acquisitions 
of property, power, and honor, should all generally be ren- 



60 

dered proportionate to the future industry, good conduct, and 
improved talents of every individual. 
' Thus labor and capital here are made to have but one true 
interest, and to find that " self-love and social are the same." 

The scourges of avarice, in its too great voracity for wealth 
or capital, will always be the irregular depredations on it of 
labor, if left badly paid or badly taught, and the true bless- 
ings of labor will be its honest and timely acquisitions of capi- 
tal, if made able to learn and practise its appropriate duties as 
well as rights. Then, though steadfast and zealous in re- 
sisting the seductions of power, the timidities of sloth, the 
effeminacy of luxury, and the mercenary, sordid spirit of 
mere gain, the working classes will, at the same time, be 
careful to shape and crowd forward all their claims in sub- 
jection to order, and in the safe channels of law and well- 
regulated liberty. 

It would hardly be necessary, before this assembly, to ad- 
vance any further arguments deduced from our history in 
proof of the peculiar importance, or indeed vitality, of sound 
morals as well as sound education, in such a government as 
ours, at all times, and more especially in periods of increased 
peril. They, indeed, always constitute a power higher than 
the law itself, and possess a healthy vigor much beyond the 
law. Nor, under our admirable system, does the promotion 
of morality require any, as mere citizens, to aid it, through 
political favor, to the cause of any particular creed of religion, 
however deep may be our individual convictions of its truth 
or importance beyond all the world can give or the world 
take away. Our public associations for purposes of govern- 
ment now wisely relate to secular concerns alone. 

Surely, any of us can be the worthy descendants of tlie 
Puritans without being, after the increased lights of two 
hundred more years, puritanical, in the indulgence of big- 
otry or in placing any reliance on the dangerous and it is 
hoped exploded union of church and state for public security. 



61 

On the contrary, the progress of temperance, the improve- 
ment in household comlbrts, the wider diffusion of knowl- 
edge as well as of competency in property, and the associa- 
tion, so intimate and radical, between enlarged intelligence 
and the growth of moral worth and even religious principle, 
with the advantages all mutually confer and receive, consti- 
tute our safest dependance, and exhibit a characteristic, 
striking and highly creditable to our whole country, as well 
as in some degree to the present age. If, constantly rein- 
forced by those exertions of the enlightened, the virtuous, 
and the talented, which they can well spare, and which duty, 
honor, and safety demand, they seem to encourage strong 
hopes that the arm of the law will not hereafter be so often 
palsied by any moral indifference among the people at large, 
or in any quarter, as to its strength to guide as well as hold 
the helm. 

At such a crisis, therefore, and in such a cause, yielding to 
neither consternation nor despair, may we not all profit by 
the vehement exhortations of Cicero to Atticus : "If you arc 
asleep, awake ; if you are standing, move ; if you are moving, 
run; if you are running, fly." 

All these considerations warn us — the grave-stones of 
almost every former republic warn us — that a high standard 
of moral rectitude, as well as of intelligence, is quite as indis- 
pensable to communities in their public doings as to individuals, 
if they would escape from either degeneracy or disgrace. 

There need be no morbid delicacy in employing on this sub- 
ject a tone at once plain and fearless. Much of our own his- 
tory unites in admonishing all, that those public doings should 
be characterized, when towards the members of the same con- 
federacy, not by exasperations or taunts, but by mutual con- 
cessions, in cases of conflicting claims — by amicable compro- 
mises where no tribunal is provided for equal arbitration — by 
exact justice to the smallest as well as to the largest State ; 
and, through all irritations and rebuffs, the more bitter often 
because partaking of the freedom of their family origin, by an 



r 



62 

inflexible adherence to that spirit of conciliation, and to that 
cultivation of harmony, through mutual affection and mutual 
benefits rather than force, which, honorable, if not always 
honored, formed and has hitherto sustained our happy Union. 
When towards other nations they should evince what Ander- 
son, half a century ago, considered " the best temper of gov- 
ernment, neither to do a wrong or take it." By the aid of such 
an example here, with our abhorrence of the spirit of conquest, 
and our devotion to a mutual interchange among all nations of 
only favors, rather than injuries, it is believed that the art of 
printing, so widely diffused as it has been of late, and the 
greater facilities of communication between most parts of the 
known world by means of an increasing commerce and wider 
employment of machinery and steam, are fast creating a great 
tribunal, even on earth, for the moral judgment, and we hope, 
improvement of all nations. Public opinion is in this way 
yearly becoming more pervading among every civilized people, 
more enlightened, and, therefore, with safety and advantage, 
more omnipotent. May it not be hoped that all nations as well 
as our own are thus receiving some stronger impulses towards 
a higher state of refinement, both intellectual and moral ?-? In 
fine, it is believed that our convictions must strengthen, as re- 
searches into history and its true philosophy penetrate wider 
and deeper ; that, should the experiment of self-government 
and increased civil freedom fail in this country, where the most 
flattering prospect appears to exist of perfecting far as prac- 
ticable the condition of our species, and accomplishing soonest 
the probable though in some degree mysterious end of their 
creation, it requires not the spirit of prophecy to predict that 
less hope exists in favor of the success of such an experiment 
elsewhere, and that any nearer approach to the golden age of 
equal liberty, and the more universal diffusion of moral and 
religious as well as intellectual and political light, must be re- 
garded as reserved only for some Utopia of the imagination, 
or some miraculous millenium of Christianity. ' 



63 



NOTES. 



[Several portions of the preceding Address were omitted in 
the delivery, from fear of being tedious. A few details were 
originally flung into Notes, which are |b-©re^annexed.] 

A.— Page 7. 

Three or four illustrations of our recent progress on some of these subjects 
may perhaps be usefully noticed. 

COTTON. 

1.— The exports of raw cotton, in 1825, amounted to - 176,500,000 pounds. 
Do in 1835, do - 386,500,000 " 

2. — Raw cotton consumed or manufactured in the United 

States in 1825, amounted to - - - - 50,000,000 '« 

Do in 1835, amounted to 100,000,000 " 

3. — Imports of cotton goods into United States, from all countries, 

in 1825, value - $12,509,516 
Do in 1835, only - 15,367,585 

4. — Exports of cotton goods from United States in 1825, foreign 3,784,692 

Do domestic so small not designated. 

Do in 1835, foreign - 3,697,837 

Do domestic - 2,858,681 

See more in the Tables and Notes on Cotton, submitted by me to Congress 
at its last session. 

COAL. 

Quantity of Coal imparled into the United States, 
In 1825, bushels, $722,255 5 value $108,527. 
In 1835, do. 1,679,119 ^ do. 143,461. 
The domestic product, though vastly increased, does not prevent the im- 
ports from having nearly doubled in quantity in ten years, though the price has 
sersibly fallen. 



64 

LEAD. 

Statement of the quantity and value of Lead imported info the United States du- 
ring the years ending on the 30th September, 1825, and on the 30th Septem- 
ber, 1835. 

Quantity, lbs. Value. 
Year ending oOth September, 1825, - - 5,867,520 $293,864 

Do- Jo. 1835, . - 1,006,472 35,663 

The domestic product now supplies almost the whole consumption. 

SALT. 

1. The salt manufactured in the United States amounted, in 1830, to above 
three and a half millions of bushels ; two-fifths of which was made in the 
Slate of New York. 

2. Salt made in 1835, about 5,000,000 bushels— the proportion manufactured 
in New York being about the same. 

3. Quantity imported in 1830, about 5,374,046 bushels ; in 1835, about 
' 5,375,364 bushels. 

The domestic product now supplies all the increased consumption by our 
additional population, and near half of all the consumption of the whole Union. 

These remarks and statistical details on the above and other articles, with 
numerous similar ones, might be largely extended, if space permitted and the 
occasion were suitable. 

B.— Page 8. 

The republication of the Journals of the Old Congress, the printing of the 
Proceedings of the Convention which formed the Constitution, and the collec- 
tion and publication of our Diplomatic Correspondence, have done for this branch 
of history much service. They have been followed, as illustrative of a still 
later period, by the State Papers of Wait, the Executive Senate Journals, and 
the new Documents, as well as excellent arrangement of the old ones, both 
Executive and Legislative, in the compilation ordered by Congress a few years 
since, under the memorial of, and printed by, Messrs. Gales &. Seaton. 

C— Page 10. 
The particulars for inquiry would especially include its legislation and ju- 
diciary, its army and navy, commerce, agriculture, and manufactures, its mints, 
currency and banks, its medals and coins, its hospitals and fine arts, its rev- 
enues and expenditures, exports and imports, the extent and character of all 
pubhc property, elections and wars, roads and canals, temperatures and 
storms, the most important vegetables and animals, wild or domestic, and the 
national civil improvements and enterprises of every essential character, from 
breakwaters, dry docks, and various public buildings, to the manufacture and 



65 

uniformity of weights and measures, and the advancing survey of our exten- 
sive seacoasts. More connected with the diflerent States, but still within the 
scope of our researches, at the centre of them all, would be the character and 
progress of these several subjects among each of them, adding the great fea- 
tures in their local occupations and manners, amusements, theatres, and fash- 
ions, religion and literature, diseases and superstitions, pauper systems, statis- 
tics of crime, marriages, deaths, and population, police, and general slate of the 
arts, education, and morals. 

A portion of these inquiries, with other similar ones, and their continuance 
yearly, would afford a most interesting, useful, and ample employment for 
some public department of Government, furnished with power and resources 
to push them widely, and with energy and accuracy. Whether called a home 
department, a domestic one, or one for the interior, would be of less impor- 
tance than the powers conferred, and the talent and industry exclusively de- 
voted to it. 

D.— Page 14. 

A small number of the causes of failures in Indian civilization can be accu- 
rately detected from our histories, and i'ully exposed for warning and cor- 
rection. 

Sometimes the love of conquest has irritated a jealous race, and defeated all 
prospect of immediate improvement. Sometimes a zeal without knowledge 
has too hastily required their assent to principles of religion and conduct, 
which only a high degree of intelligence could properly appreciate. Some- 
times the cursed thirst for gold has wantonly plunged them into wars. Some- 
times an encroaching spirit for more fertile valleys and prairies has goaded them 
into border wars, or vindictive and bloody aggressions and ruin! Sometimes, 
in self-defence, we may have fomented their internal divisions, and aggravated 
their neighboi'ing jealousies, revenges, and hostilities! Sometimes they have 
refused the useful arts, because more laborious than the chase! Sometimes de- 
rided letters, because more enervating and unmanly than war! Sometimes our 
traders have tempted their appetites for the poisonous distillations of art, rather 
than encoui'age them in agriculture or manufactures! Sometimes we have 
acted without system or principle, and, in the festering feelings from savage 
obstinacy and atrocities, have left almost every thing to private cupidity or ava- 
rice, and afterwards, by the recoil of the spring, resorted to measures more 
strict and uniform than their undisciplined condition rendered|at first wise. The 
( true philosophy of their history seems to be, that the Indians, if we would do 
any thing to improve them durably, must be more regarded as in a state of pu- 
pilage, being, in many respects, but children of a larger growth ; as too igno- 
rant for forming many wise institutions of their own, and hence properly sub- 
ject to discreet restraints by us on their moral errors as well as political power, 
6 



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WERT 
BOOKBINDING 

Cfantwiie. Pa 
Sept Oct 1988 



